ECB – Dr Oliver Hartwich

Making sense of the ECB’s pandemic interventions

29/06/2020

The ECB’s policies are the macro-economic equivalent of trading on while insolvent. All these interventions are papering over the cracks in the European economy, but they are not solving them. […]

The greening of the ECB

09/12/2019

Lagarde is about to set a dangerous example for an activist, winner-picking central bank. It is a precedent for the ECB itself – and for other central banks wishing to follow the ECB’s transformation. […]

Trapped in a low-interest environment

25/11/2019

The reason for the Germans’ current Weltuntergangsstimmung (apocalyptic mood) is economic. A new book promising “The biggest crash of all time” before 2023 tops Amazon.de’s bestseller list. And now the Bundesbank, the country’s central bank, has joined the choir of doomsday merchants with its annual Financial Stability Report. […]

An ECB dead end

17/03/2016

If you are a born optimist, you may have concluded by now that the euro crisis is over. Indeed, we have not heard much about it lately. No bailouts, no bank runs, no Greek elections. It almost feels like financial stability. If you are a realist, however, you would be looking at two figures and know that we are right in the middle of the euro crisis. […]