Do you want to save the Euro? Well one idea for how to do it has been proposed by University of Missouri-St Louis history professor John Gillingham: reissuing the 12 national currencies that were replaced with just one, while at the same time retaining the euro as a parallel currency that finds its market value [...]

Morgan Stanley’s Stephen Len is obviously on the same page as I am about how the rising interest rate differential between Europe and the US is likely to drive short term currency movements:
Policy rate differentials are especially important now for the currency markets, and it pays to focus on central banks these days.
Reason 1. [...]

Germany isn’t the only EU country where serious ongoing economic problems are leading to political gridlock. Italy’s situation is no better, and arguably worse. This ‘worse’ aspect was pushed into the headlines yesterday by the resignation of Economy Minister Domenico Siniscalco. This is sending shock waves throughout the entire Italian political system. It still isn’t [...]

Really I realise I have been remiss in another important sense. I have long assumed that in fact the decision to reduce deficits was taken due to the coming fiscal pressure from ageing. This certainly was the background to the discussion. However now I look at the details of the SPG this area is not [...]

The euro is trading this morning at around $1.2150. The big issue seems to be the US trade deficit, which is currently outweighing all other considerations. Still what goes down can come up, and what goes up……
The dollar fell to the lowest in two weeks against the euro, the biggest move of any currency, on [...]

The euro fell briefly below $1.19 yesterday. There is nothing surprising or exceptional about that, the common currency has been drifting steadily downwards against the dollar for a number of, by-now, pretty well known reasons - better economic performance in the US, a growing interest rate differential between the ECB and the Fed, political issues [...]

The papers this morning seem to be all full of ‘gloomy’ articles whose principal theme is that Europe has finally been plunged into a grave crisis by this weeks summit.
“People will tell you next that Europe is not in a crisis,” Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker, who holds the EU presidency, said after [...]

Well I’ve been reading about the Germans, the Italians, now apparently it is the turn of the French to feel naustalgic:
“Three out of five French people miss their old currency, replaced by the euro in 2002, a survey for Valeurs Actuelles magazine showed on Wednesday. In February 2002 that figure was just 39 percent.
While the [...]

So are the China trade surplus ones. Dave at MacroBlog has the details on China. I’m waiting for Brad Setser to post, but he must be either doing his sums, or having a late breakfast :). Before we get some blog analysis (even Brad Delong is quiet today) you can get the basics here. In [...]

This week Hungary has a new President. The election of Laszlo Solyom as Hungary’s new President was a major setback for the governing Socialist Party (MSZP), at the same time as it was widely lauded as a victory by the right wing opposition Fidesz party. The outcome was largely the result [...]