Europe

In the UK, there are signs that policy makers have started to manage expectations about the potential for the Funding for Lending Scheme (FLS) to contribute to any meaningful increase in lending. As we discuss below, and although it is very early days, it is hard to discern any concrete evidence of a greater willingness [...]

Greece and Spain may be grabbing the headlines, but the eurozone crisis is taking a toll beyond the borders of the ‘periphery’. When it comes to events in Europe, all eyes have been on the periphery – countries like Greece, Spain and Italy – where the worst fiscal and economic challenges exist, and on Germany, [...]

The remarkable rally in Spanish stocks over the last several weeks has largely closed the valuation gap between this part of the eurozone periphery and stocks in the rest of the region. Mario Draghi’s pledge to do “whatever it takes” to save the euro sent share prices in regions on the periphery of the eurozone [...]

The past week has seen a raft of news with big implications for several individual countries and the global economy as a whole. ECB President, Mario Draghi, has now unveiled the long-awaited ECB plan for purchasing bonds. The announcement of the scheme, called Outright Monetary Transactions (OMT), combined with the news that the German Constitutional [...]

Peugeot has failed to keep pace as other global automakers have consolidated their recovery in recent years; its profitability woes may simply grow if credit rating agencies slash their ratings on its debt. Operating profit margins for the automotive industry began to stabilize in early 2010, after covering a lot of bumpy ground during the [...]

BRIC correlation with the emerging markets universe is rising, fueling criticism of the decade-old strategy. For more than a decade, the idea of the BRICs – four emerging market powerhouse nations – has been one of the hottest, most buzzed-about investment concepts and attracted billions of dollars from both institutional and individual investors. Now, the [...]

There has been a great deal of recent debate and speculation over the steps that central banks have taken, and might soon take in order to deal with slowing growth, and the European debt crisis. The outlook for inflation is a key consideration for monetary policymakers, and in this article we present our latest forecasts. [...]

The euro zone manufacturing sector contracted faster than previously thought last month, despite factories cutting prices, as core countries failed to provide any support, a survey showed on Monday. The downturn that began in the smaller periphery members of the 17-nation bloc is now sweeping through Germany and France and the situation remained dire in [...]

There has been some relatively good news from the US over the past week – a small upward revision to GDP, driven in part by stronger consumer spending; and the first rise in house prices over a twelve-month period since 2010, according to the widely-watched Case-Shiller index. On a three-month annualised basis, prices are up [...]

Britain’s economy shrank less than first thought in the second quarter of 2012 but remains in recession. How does its GDP growth compare with other countries? UK real GDP is still below 2008 levels and of the countries in the chart only Italy has a slower growth rate since then. Taking the chart back further [...]