IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbb/reswpp/201310-243.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The fragility of two monetary regimes: The European Monetary System and the Eurozone

Author

Listed:
  • Paul De Grauwe

    (LSE
    CEPS)

  • Yuemei Ji

    (University College London)

Abstract

We analyze the similarities and the differences in the fragility of the European Monetary System (EMS) and the Eurozone. We test the hypothesis that in the EMS the fragility arose from the absence of a credible lender of last resort in the foreign exchange markets while in the Eurozone it was the absence of a lender of last resort in the long-term government bond markets that caused the fragility. We conclude that in the EMS the national central banks were weak and fragile, and the national governments were insulated from this weakness by the fact that they kept their own national currencies. In the Eurozone the roles were reversed. The national central banks that became part of the Eurosystem were strengthened.

Suggested Citation

  • Paul De Grauwe & Yuemei Ji, 2013. "The fragility of two monetary regimes: The European Monetary System and the Eurozone," Working Paper Research 243, National Bank of Belgium.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbb:reswpp:201310-243
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nbb.be/doc/ts/publications/wp/wp243en.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Eichengreen, Barry & Mody, Ashoka, 2000. "Lending booms, reserves and the sustainability of short-term debt: inferences from the pricing of syndicated bank loans," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(1), pages 5-44, October.
    2. Obstfeld, Maurice, 1986. "Rational and Self-fulfilling Balance-of-Payments Crises," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(1), pages 72-81, March.
    3. De Grauwe, Paul, 2016. "Economics of Monetary Union," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, edition 11, number 9780198739876.
    4. Francesco Giavazzi & Marco Pagano, 1990. "Can Severe Fiscal Contractions Be Expansionary? Tales of Two Small European Countries," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1990, Volume 5, pages 75-122, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Jonathan Eaton & Mark Gersovitz & Joseph E. Stiglitz, 1991. "The Pure Theory of Country Risk," NBER Chapters, in: International Volatility and Economic Growth: The First Ten Years of The International Seminar on Macroeconomics, pages 391-435, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Paul De Grauwe, 2014. "The Governance of a Fragile Eurozone," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Exchange Rates and Global Financial Policies, chapter 12, pages 297-320, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    7. James, Harold, 2012. "Making the European Monetary Union," Economics Books, Harvard University Press, number 9780674066830, Spring.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Corrado Macchiarelli, 2018. "What is the EU-UK relation all about? Tracking the path from monetary integration to “ever closeness”," LEQS – LSE 'Europe in Question' Discussion Paper Series 137, European Institute, LSE.
    2. De Grauwe, Paul & Ji, Yuemei, 2022. "The fragility of the Eurozone: has it disappeared?," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 112543, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    3. Christophe Blot & Jérôme Creel & Paul Hubert & Fabien Labondance, 2020. "The role of ECB monetary policy and financial stress on Eurozone sovereign yields," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 59(3), pages 1189-1211, September.
    4. Camarero, Mariam & Carrion-i-Silvestre, Josep Lluís & Tamarit, Cecilio, 2015. "Testing for external sustainability under a monetary integration process. Does the Lawson doctrine apply to Europe?," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 343-349.
    5. Fendel Ralf & Frenkel Michael, 2019. "Putting European Monetary Integration into a Historical Perspective: Two Decades of the European Monetary System versus Two Decades of the European Monetary Union," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 239(5-6), pages 769-795, October.
    6. De Grauwe, Paul & Ji, Yuemei, 2014. "How much Fiscal Discipline in a Monetary Union?," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 39(PB), pages 348-360.
    7. Gros, Daniel, 2014. "The EMS Crisis of the 1990s: Parallels with the present crisis?," CEPS Papers 9119, Centre for European Policy Studies.
    8. Christophe Blot & Jérôme Creel & Paul Hubert & Fabien Labondance, 2017. "Eurozone bond market dynamics, ECB monetary policy and financial stress," Documents de Travail de l'OFCE 2017-18, Observatoire Francais des Conjonctures Economiques (OFCE).
    9. Paniagua, Jordi & Sapena, Juan & Tamarit, Cecilio, 2017. "Sovereign debt spreads in EMU: The time-varying role of fundamentals and market distrust," Journal of Financial Stability, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 187-206.
    10. Balli, Faruk & Pericoli, Filippo M. & Pierucci, Eleonora, 2018. "Globalization and international risk-sharing: The role of social and political integration," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 324-345.
    11. De Grauwe, Paul & Ji, Yuemei, 2022. "The fragility of the Eurozone: Has it disappeared?," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    12. Dana Kiselakova & Beata Sofrankova & Miroslava Soltes, 2016. "Analytical View on the Financial and Social Stability within the Euro Area: Empirical Evidence from Slovakia," International Journal of Economics and Financial Issues, Econjournals, vol. 6(4), pages 1637-1645.
    13. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/8vns9so6b9pnqfo7eebjgfann is not listed on IDEAS
    14. Nikolaos Antonakakis & Ioannis Chatziantoniou & David Gabauer, 2021. "The impact of Euro through time: Exchange rate dynamics under different regimes," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(1), pages 1375-1408, January.
    15. Heimberger, Philipp, 2023. "Public debt and r-g risks in advanced economies: Eurozone versus stand-alone," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    16. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/8vns9so6b9pnqfo7eebjgfann is not listed on IDEAS

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. De Grauwe, Paul & Ji, Yuemei, 2014. "How much Fiscal Discipline in a Monetary Union?," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 39(PB), pages 348-360.
    2. De Grauwe, Paul & Ji, Yuemei, 2013. "Self-fulfilling crises in the Eurozone: An empirical test," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 15-36.
    3. De Grauwe, Paul & Ji, Yuemei & Steinbach, Armin, 2017. "The EU debt crisis: Testing and revisiting conventional legal doctrine," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 29-37.
    4. Pompeo Della Posta, 2014. "Self-fulfilling and fundamentals based speculative attacks on public debt," Discussion Papers 2014/178, Dipartimento di Economia e Management (DEM), University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy.
    5. van Riet, Ad, 2016. "Safeguarding the euro as a currency beyond the state," Occasional Paper Series 173, European Central Bank.
    6. De Grauwe, Paul & Ji, Yuemei, 2014. "Disappearing government bond spreads in the eurozone � Back to normal?," CEPS Papers 9249, Centre for European Policy Studies.
    7. Della Posta, Pompeo, 2021. "Government size and speculative attacks on public debt," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 79-89.
    8. Paul De Grauwe & Yuemei Ji, 2014. "The Future of the Eurozone," Manchester School, University of Manchester, vol. 82(S1), pages 15-34, September.
    9. Schuster, Florian, 2023. "Spreads auf Staatsanleihezinsen, der EZB-Sicherheitenrahmen und Peripherieprämien in der Eurozone," Papers 277910, Dezernat Zukunft - Institute for Macrofinance, Berlin.
    10. Steininger, Lea & Hesse, Casimir, 2024. "Buying into new ideas: The ECB’s evolving justification of unlimited liquidity," Department of Economics Working Paper Series 357, WU Vienna University of Economics and Business.
    11. Schelkle, Waltraud, 2017. "Hamilton�s Paradox Revisited: Alternative lessons from US history," CEPS Papers 12963, Centre for European Policy Studies.
    12. Della Posta, Pompeo, 2016. "Currency and external debt crises: A unifying framework," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 38(4), pages 723-736.
    13. Lea Steininger & Casimir Hesse, 2024. "Buying into new ideas: The ECB’s evolving justification of unlimited liquidity," Department of Economics Working Papers wuwp357, Vienna University of Economics and Business, Department of Economics.
    14. Collignon, Stefan & Esposito, Piero, 2021. "Macroeconomic imbalances in Europe: How to overcome the fallacy of unit labour costs," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 43(3), pages 673-691.
    15. Deborah Mabbett & Waltraud Schelkle, 2015. "What difference does Euro membership make to stabilization? The political economy of international monetary systems revisited," Review of International Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(3), pages 508-534, June.
    16. Carlo Klein, 2021. "The Never-Ending Quest for the European Fiscal Policy’s Objectives: Stability vs. Convergence or Stability and Convergence?," Athens Journal of Business & Economics, Athens Institute for Education and Research (ATINER), vol. 7(1), pages 41-66, January.
    17. Dennis Bonam & Jasper Lukkezen, 2013. "Government Spending Shocks, Sovereign Risk and the Exchange Rate Regime," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 13-212/VI, Tinbergen Institute, revised 09 Jan 2013.
    18. Bruneau, Catherine & Delatte, Anne-Laure & Fouquau, Julien, 2014. "Was the European sovereign crisis self-fulfilling? Empirical evidence about the drivers of market sentiments," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 38-51.
    19. Schuster, Florian, 2023. "Sovereign spreads, central bank collateral frameworks, and periphery premia in the Eurozone," Papers 277915, Dezernat Zukunft - Institute for Macrofinance, Berlin.
    20. John Phelan, 2015. "The Road Not Taken: A Comparison Between the Hard ECU and the Euro," Economic Affairs, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(3), pages 397-415, October.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    government bond markets; interbank money market; interest rate spread; Eurozone; EMS; fragility;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E42 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Monetary Sytsems; Standards; Regimes; Government and the Monetary System
    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy
    • E58 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Central Banks and Their Policies
    • F33 - International Economics - - International Finance - - - International Monetary Arrangements and Institutions

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nbb:reswpp:201310-243. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/bnbgvbe.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.