European growth : what's to be done

By: Jean Pisani Ferry, Bruegel

Some proposals on how to kick-start the economy.

House prices have 30-40% more to fall

By: Wolfgang Münchau

Here is an interview with me on CNBC on the housing market situation in western Europe and the US.

Spain’s budget deficit likely to surpass 3% next year

Zapatero administration plans to announce yet another stimulus next week; Jurgen Stark warns against excessive stimulus programmes, citing bad experiences with discretionary fiscal policies; ambitions to join the euro area are tempered by reactions from inside, at least for Hungary and the Baltics; in the UK, the debate about euro membership grows increasingly intense; the European Parliament, meanwhile, toned down its criticism of the ECB in its 10-year report on the euro.

Pressure is growing for a European stimulus

The EU is preparing for a combination of national, and EU-level stimulus to mitigate the recession; German government agrees to help Opel, under strict conditions; McCreevy wants to impose a central counterparty for the market credit defaults swaps; France is swept by a wave of strikes this week; Belgian wages to rise some 6% over the next two years, despite financial crisis; Irish economists predicts national “deflation”; Irish opinion polls, meanwhile, suggest there is now a majority for accepting the Lisbon Treaty.

After the banks, let's bail out the car industry

Germany and US are pondering to bail out large parts of the car industry as recession bites; a chaotic Socialist party election process goes into next round after Delanoe drops out; Jean Pierre Jouyet will quit the French government to became head of the French SEC; the European Commission imposes tough conditions on German bank bailouts; global leaders, meanwhile, held an inconsequential summit in Washington.

Germany supports pan-European banking regulator

Merkel adopts Issing group G20 action plan, a wide-ranging set of problems to fix global and European finance; Germany’s 10-year bond auction flopped, an ominous sign for the European bond markets; Mario Draghi calls for an enlargement membership base of the Financial Stability Forum; Germany foreign minister, meanwhile, launches his own rescue plan, which is very close to Sarkozy’s plan for a gouvernement economique in Europe.

As Paulson opens his mouth, global equity markets crash again

US markets now close their October low as Paulson abandons TARP for a new programme to support the markets for securitised consumer products; the British pounds hits a new low against the euro; euro area industrial production was down sharply in September; the Irish commercial property market is in free-fall; Trichet advocates economic discipline in hard times, as King favours a stimulus; the European Commission, meanwhile, has introduced tough new regulations for rating agencies.