Neil Dwane (Allianz) | As Europe faces a world that may soon encompass Brexit and widening trade tension between the EU, the US and China – as well as growing political strains centred around Iran, Russia, Ukraine, NATO, Nordstream II and climate change, the next EU President faces an even more complex yet pressing array of challenges.
Ioannis Glinavos via Macropolis | Greece is heading for a general election on July 7. A great part of the political narrative around this election is a confrontation between a supposedly fantastical leftist alternative and a mature, European direction for Greece. The former is represented by Alexis Tsipras and SYRIZA, while the latter is allegedly promised by Kyriakos Mitsotakis and New Democracy.
J.L.M. Campuzano (AEB) | The European Central Bank released the data of the M3 and its counterparts in the euro area until May. The intermediate liquidity objective maintains its annual evolution stable by 4.8%, supported by a strong increase of 7.2% in cash and demand deposits. The rest of its components, such as deposits and market instruments, maintain marginal growth.
More than two months after the elections, the European Council agreed on the future leadership of the EU institutions. Spanish Foreign minister Josep Borrell will be the next foreign policy chief; Ursula von der Leyen will lead the Commission; Charles Michel, the Council and Christine Lagarde will be the next ECB head.
Jens Bastian via Macropolis | The German government’s view of the candidates for prime minister ahead of Greece’s early elections on July 7 is rather ambiguous. This is largely due to the fact that PM Tsipras has undergone a remarkable political transition in office. His efforts at staging various policy U-turns over the course of the past four years have led to an impressive reassessment in Berlin of his term as Greek prime minister.
Jean-Christophe Delfim (Edmond de Rothschild ) | Economic growth in the Eurozone was 1.9% in 2018. However, in the last quarter a slowdown was observed to 1.2% yoy, due to the negative contribution of the trade balance (-0.4 pp), as a consequence of the sharp deceleration in exports provoked by international trade disputes.
Shaun Riordan | In the past, Spain has cashed in influence for money, as when Felipe Gonzalez was able to convince even Margaret Thatcher to grant Spain cohesion funds. But that is no longer the game.
Ana Fuentes | The musical chairs for top institutional renewal in Brussels has begun. At stake are the presidencies of the European Commission, the European Council, the European Parliament and the European Central Bank, as well as the representative for Unión diplomacy. For Spain, opportunities may open up. Yet the government has to deal with the after effects of the Catalan conflict, which has not questioned its democratic legitimacy, although it may compromise its margin of maneuver.
“Beyond our scepticism about the ability of new stimulus measures to drive the economy, we recognise that the ECB is obliged to act which will create a situation unfavourable for its inflation targets,” analysts at Intermoney point out. In this scenario, we consider that the reactivation of asset purchases with certain adjustments (based on the reality of German debt) would be the measure with the greatest positive impact, more so than interest rate cuts. Nevertheless, if the second path is explored, it would be accompanied by measures to mitigate the effect of negative rates on the banking sector.
The European Central Bank will have to relax its monetary policy again, possibly through further reductions in interest rates or the purchase of assets, if inflation in the eurozone does not meet its target. Chairman Mario Draghi underlined that the ECB’s the limits are flexible because the its legal powers allow it to deploy tools that are both “necessary and proportionate”.