Europe’s Fitful Financial Integration

The road to pan-European financial regulation over the last two decades has been winding and rocky. But the general direction is clear: Unless the new internal market commissioner takes a different view, the European Commission will push further in the direction of centralization.

LONDON – The well-publicized troubles of Portugal’s Banco Espírito Santo this summer have reminded us that the eurozone’s financial problems are by no means resolved. There are, no doubt, idiosyncratic factors behind the bank’s problems, stemming from its exposure to other parts of the Espírito Santo family’s empire. But when the bank announced a first-half loss of €3.6 billion ($4.7 billion), the sudden collapse of confidence was alarming, and nervous investors are asking whether there are similar time bombs ticking elsewhere.

https://prosyn.org/fYo0MrH