Following the US tariff announcements in early April, the US dollar strongly depreciated while US Treasury yields rose. This column zooms in on the April episode, analysing the co-movement of asset prices with an estimated market ‘safe-haven factor’. It shows that the co-movement of the US dollar with the ‘safe-haven factor’ changed in April, and […]
Over the past 30 years, laws in Italy have become longer, more convoluted, and frequently unintelligible even to seasoned legal professionals. This column exploits variation in the ability of lower courts to interpret poorly drafted laws in alignment with Italy’s Supreme Court of Cassation to assess how legal uncertainty affects the local economy. The authors […]
Britain’s ambition to rev up its economy and tap the AI revolution faces the harsh reality that the abundant, clean and reliable electricity supply this requires is unlikely to materialise any time soon. Prime Minister Keir Starmer has laid out several major industrial policies aimed at reviving Britain’s sluggish economy, including by pouring investment into the artificial […]
Chinese EV investment aids EU decarbonisation but brings risks, needing a united EU strategy to align it with climate, industrial and security aims. The European Union’s push to decarbonise road transport relies critically on a rapid shift to electric vehicles (EVs). However, European carmakers face high production costs and limited battery capacity, leaving them unable […]
Europe has recently pivoted to regulatory simplification with the aim to boost competitiveness. This column argues that in banking the debate needs to go beyond competitiveness and be embedded within a broader strategic vision fit for the new geopolitical context. The broader vision should consider the dependence on the US dollar-centric financial system, the increasing […]
For years, the World Bank Group’s systems for measuring results operated in parallel tracks: corporate Scorecards that monitored performance through outcome-level targets, and impact evaluations that investigated what works, for whom, and why. Both were powerful in their own right—but too often disconnected. That is beginning to change. In today’s context of tighter budgets, more […]
Central banks raise interest rates to reduce aggregate demand and bring inflation down. This column uses credit register data and product-level price data from the euro area to highlight a parallel and potentially offsetting supply-side mechanism. It shows that in markets where firms rely more heavily on floating-rate loans, the ECB’s monetary tightening had a […]
Nature markets can boost conservation funding, but strong standards and public support are vital for lasting, equitable ecological benefits Natural ecosystems are declining rapidly, ultimately threatening economies, livelihoods and climate stability. The public funding available to protect and restore nature is far below what is needed to maintain healthy, biodiverse ecosystems that provide water, soil, pollination and […]
Governments are increasingly employing industrial subsidies, raising questions about their market implications. This column undertakes a thorough econometric testing of the causal impacts of subsidies on several firm performance indicators for large manufacturing companies. The authors find that subsidies increase firms’ market shares but have either no impact, or a negative impact on investment and […]
Businesses will find it easier to get state aid for projects aimed at cutting their carbon emissions and to switch to green projects while heavy industries will benefit from temporary power price relief under looser rules announced by the European Commission on Wednesday. The new state aid rules, valid until December 2030, are part of […]
