In the medium term there are reasons to believe that the euro should appreciate very gradually over the coming year, boosted by the reduction of EMU–US interest rate differentials and the increased demand for euros to acquire the new European asset known as coronabonds.
As lockdown began, thousands of patients were sent from hospitals into care homes. In three months 18,562 people living in Care Homes died with COVID-19. Our report As if Expendable highlights the UK Government’s failure to protect older people in care homes during the COVID-19 pandemic. Cases of coronavirus are rising again in the build-up to winter, the government must learn lessons from its disastrous decisions and not repeat the same mistakes.
The ECB is focusing on the proactive management of NPLs, linking the dividend policy to the impact of Covid19 on credit quality. Estimates suggest an increase in delinquency rates of up to €1.4 Tr in an adverse macro scenario, equivalent to 5.7% of the capital ratio. At a round table organized last week by the Bundesbank, Banco Santander chairman Ana Patricia Botín argued that the dividend veto is one reason why the banking sector is not sufficiently resilient “in terms of its ability to attract capital.”
Intermoney | ECB President Christine Lagarde acknowledged yesterday that the central bank would consider formulas to allow inflation to exceed 2%, without being forced to raise rates and suffocate the recovery. Reality, as Lagarde indeed acknowledged, is in keeping with a world in which inflation targets must be transformed. They were designed to avoid upward deviations, but not to deal with prolonged situations of inflation deficit.
Shares in the new Siemens Energy started trading on Monday. The new company includes 100% of the former Gas & Power division plus 67% of Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy. Siemens has handed over to shareholders 55% of Siemens Energy via a kind of share dividend, in the proportion of one Siemens Energy share for every two Siemens shares. While 9.9% goes to Siemens Pension-Trust, Siemens holds a direct 35.1% stake. That said, its aim is to continue to reduce its participation in the next 12-18 months.
The payment market in Sweden and Norway is being digitized. To give an international comparison, the cash in circulation as a percentage of GDP variable is used as a proxy for the demand for cash. In 2018, the cash in these two economies was equivalent to 1.3% and 1.5% of their GDP, respectively. In contrast, in the United States and the Eurozone, this variable was at 8.2% and 10.9%, respectively.
UK Chancellor Rishi Sunak today delivered a series of new measures and extensions to existing supports to help the UK economy through the winter months following the re-emergence of the coronavirus and re-imposition of wider restrictions on activity.
The European banking landscape does not look much worse six months into the pandemic-triggered economic crisis than before Covid-19 struck. Loan-loss provisions are higher, there is negative pressure on top-line revenues and gloomy market predictions linger. But the prospect of a new banking crisis is remote. The principal merit goes to the regulatory architecture set up in Europe after the Great Financial Crisis.
The European Central Bank has decided to allow the lenders it directly supervises in the region, on a temporary basis until June 27, 2021, to exclude certain exposures to the central bank from their leverage ratio. In this way, the institutions will have more room to incur debt since the ECB will not require more capital for it. In fact the ECB will not take into account the liquidity (cash and deposits) banks hold at the central bank when calculating the leverage ratio (Capital/Assets).
Santander Corporate & Investment | New car registrations in Europe (EU+UK+ European Free Trade Association) plummeted 17.6% annually in August to 884,394 vehicles. Thus it broke the three-month period of smooth declines, including a 3.7% drop in July. In total, 7.267,621 new cars were registered in the European Union between January and August, almost 3.6 million less than in the same period last year. The outlook for the sector for the rest of the year is not encouraging.