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Europe > France

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Cover IMF Working Papers
Flattening the Curve and the Flight of the Rich: Pandemic-Induced Shifts in US and European Housing Markets
Nina Biljanovska and Giovanni Dell'Ariccia
The pattern of increasing suburban house prices relative to urban centers initiated during the pandemic continues to hold across the top 30 US metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs). In contrast, European countries such as Denmark, France, and the United Kingdom did not experience a similar shift in valuations. We posit and find supporting evidence that these divergent patterns partially due to differences in the characteristics of suburban areas, particularly in terms of household income and property sizes; with European suburbs being relatively poorer and characterized by smaller housing units. We show that, in the US, MSAs with suburban features more akin to those in European cities generally experienced little to no increase in suburban housing prices compared to their urban centers. Finally, our findings indicate that migration patterns of the high-income population might have partially influenced the urban-suburban revaluation in the US.
Keywords:
Property prices; House price gradient; City structure; High-income population mobility; population mobility; price gradient; housing unit; income gap; Housing prices; Income; Real estate prices; Inflation; Europe
Cover IMF Working Papers
Divided We Fall: Differential Exposure to Geopolitical Fragmentation in Trade
Shushanik Hakobyan, Sergii Meleshchuk, and Robert Zymek
This paper assesses differences in countries’ macroeconomic exposure to trade fragmentation along geopolitical lines. Estimating structural gravity regressions for sector-level bilateral trade flows between 185 countries, we find that differences in individual countries’ geopolitical ties act as a barrier to trade, with the largest effects concentrated in a few sectors (notably, food and high-end manufacturing). Consequently, countries’ exposure via trade to geopolitical shifts varies with their market size, comparative advantage, and foreign policy alignments. Introducing our estimates into a dynamic many-country, many-sector quantitative trade model, we show that geoeconomic fragmentation—modelled as an increased sensitivity of trade costs to geopolitics and greater geopolitical polarization—generally leads to lower trade and incomes. However, emerging markets and developing economies (EMDEs) tend to see the largest impacts: real per-capita income losses for the median EMDE in Asia are 80 percent larger, and for the median EMDE in Africa 120 percent larger, than for the median advanced economy. This suggests that the costs of trade fragmentation could fall disproportionally on countries that can afford it the least.
Keywords:
Geoeconomic fragmentation; trade barriers; gravity; emerging markets and developing economies; trade model; trade cost; trade fragmentation; foreign policy alignment; Plurilateral trade; Trade balance; Trade agreements; Income; Middle East and Central Asia; Sub-Saharan Africa; Asia and Pacific; Global; Africa
Cover IMF Working Papers
Inflation Indexation in Public Finances: A Global Dataset on Current Practices
Vybhavi Balasundharam, Arika Kayastha, and Marcos Poplawski Ribeiro
This paper presents a new global dataset on current practices for four budget items in terms of indexation to the price level and other nominal variables. Compiling data from documents of select multilateral organizations, governments, and related literature as well as conducting a survey among IMF country desks of 190 country-members, we show how indexation is internationally applied in (i) personal income tax brackets; (ii) pensions; (iii) social assistance programs; and (iv) public wages. The dataset shows that while indexation policies vary significantly across economies, some trends can be identified. For example, indexation is more common on pension and social grants than on taxes, and falls with the degree of economic development. We further discuss some applications of this new dataset. Those include an accounting exercise illustrating the impacts of indexation on fiscal outcomes during episodes of inflation surprises; and an analysis of the association between the overall degree of indexation combining the four budget items and inflation persistence.
Keywords:
Indexation; Inflation; Fiscal Policy; Fiscal Insititutions; inflation Indexation; indexation policy; price level; IMF country desk; impacts of indexation; indexation practice; Social assistance spending; Pensions; Pension spending; Wages; Africa; Global; Europe; Sub-Saharan Africa; Asia and Pacific
Cover Selected Issues Papers
The Fiscal Cost of Aging in Belgium: Pensions and Healthcare
Mr. Jean-Jacques Hallaert
Belgium faces a fiscal consolidation challenge at a time when the fiscal cost of aging—primarily related to pension and health outlays—is mounting. Pension spending will increase relatively fast unless a combination of measures related to pension generosity and retirement eligibility are put in place. Potential efficiency gains are large in the health sector and could absorb part of the fiscal and reorganization costs related to an aging population.
Keywords:
Belgium; Aging; Fiscal cost of aging; Pensions; Healthcare; reorganization cost; cost of aging; cost pressure; fiscal cost; healthcare cost; Pension spending; Europe; Global
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Belgium: Financial Sector Assessment Program-Detailed Assessment of Observance-Assessment of the CPSS–IOSCO Principles for Financial Market Infrastructures Euroclear Bank
International Monetary Fund. Monetary and Capital Markets Department
Euroclear Bank (EB) is a large and highly interconnected international central securities depository (ICSD) that provides critical services for global financial markets. EB, domiciled in Belgium, issues and provides custody and settlement services for international bonds (i.e., Eurobonds) in its capacity as an ICSD. It shares this role primarily with Clearstream Banking Luxembourg (CBL). EB also settles and holds in custody a wide range of domestic and internationally traded securities. In December 2019, EB was authorized under the Central Securities Depository Regulation (CSDR) of the European Union (EU) to perform so-called core CSD services, as well as non-banking- and banking-type ancillary services. EB is also licensed as a credit institution under the Belgian Banking Act. To facilitate smooth settlement, EB provides uncommitted credit facilities to its participants on an intraday and fully collateralized basis. In 2021, the value of securities held on EB’s books was EUR 17.1 trillion and it had settlement turnover of 147 million transactions with a value of EUR 653 trillion. This makes EB the most active CSD in the world (by settlement turnover), as well as the largest ICSD and third largest CSD in the world (by value of securities held).
Keywords:
resolution plan; EB's service; cyber posture; EB's ability; assessment of EB; EB's book; access implication; Securities; Credit risk; Operational risk; Collateral; Central securities depositories; Global; Europe
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Belgium: Selected Issues
International Monetary Fund. European Dept.
Selected Issues
Keywords:
state government expenditure; health efficiency frontier; cost of aging; major spending category; healthcare expenditure; Aging; Pension spending; Pensions; Fiscal consolidation; Europe; Global
Cover IMF How To Notes
How To Design Excise Taxes on Alcoholic Beverages
Mario Mansour, Patrick Petit, and Fayçal Sawadogo
This How to Note examines the complex interplay between excise taxes on alcohol and alcoholic beverages, their revenue yield, and the public health concerns related to alcohol consumption. The note suggests guidance on how countries can approach the design of excise taxes on alcohol based on theoretical principles as well as empirical evidence drawn from international experience. Key questions addressed include: How important is alcohol consumption, and what form does it take across countries of different income levels? What has been the trend in alcohol excise tax revenue? How can countries design simple excise regimes that yield revenue while having the potential to contribute to reducing the externalities and internalities caused by alcohol consumption?
Keywords:
excise taxes; alcohol consumption; public health; alcohol excise tax system; publication order; transaction arbitrage; alcohol content; Excises; Consumption; Alcohol tax; Global; Europe; Central Asia; North America; Sub-Saharan Africa
Cover Policy Papers
Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust—2023 Borrowing Agreements with the Government of Australia, the People’s Bank of China, the Bank of Finland, the Banque De France, De Nederlandsche Bank NV, the Norwegian Ministry of Finance Representing the Kingdom of Norway, Sveriges Riksbank, and the Government of the United Kingdom
International Monetary Fund. Finance Dept. and International Monetary Fund. Legal Dept.
This paper presents the second set of PRGT borrowing agreements that have been finalized through April 2023 as part of the loan mobilization round launched in July 2021 to cover the cost of pandemic-related lending and support the self-sustainability of the Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust (PRGT). Seven of the eight agreements presented use SDRs in the context of SDR channeling. Together these agreements provide a total of SDR 5.1 billion in new PRGT loan resources for low-income countries (LICs).
Keywords:
PRGT Borrowing agreements; PRGT Loans; Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust (PRGT); Concessional financing; Resource adequacy; PRGT Funding; Contributions; Transparency policy; SDR equivalent; channeling pledge; totaling SDR; PRGT loan disbursement; loan resource; Loans; Poverty reduction strategy; SDR interest rate
Cover IMF Working Papers
Financial Conditions in Europe: Dynamics, Drivers, and Macroeconomic Implications
Giovanni Borraccia, Mr. Raphael A Espinoza, Vincenzo Guzzo, Romain Lafarguette, Fuda Jiang, Vina Nguyen, Miguel A. Segoviano, and Mr. Philippe Wingender
We develop a new measure of financial conditions (FCs) that targets the growth of financial liabilities using the partial least square methodology. We then estimate financial condition indexes (FCIs) across European economies, both at the aggregate and sectoral levels. We decompose the changes in FCs into several factors including credit availability and costs, price of risk, policy stance, and funding constraints. Our results show that FCs loosened during the pandemic thanks to policy support but started to tighten significantly since mid-2021. Using the inverse probability weighting method over the sample period from 2000 to 2023, we find that a shift from a neutral to a tight FCI regime such as the ongoing episode for most European countries will on average lower output and inflation by 2.2 percent and 0.7 percentage points respectively and increase unemployment by 0.3 percentage points over a three-year horizon.
Keywords:
Financial condition index; partial least square; funding constraints; credit availability and costs; price of risk; policy stance; inverse probability weighting; financial conditions in Europe; FCI regime; IMF working paper 2023/209; FCI indicator; measure of financial conditions; Inflation; Asset prices; Monetary tightening; Credit; Financial cycles; Europe; Global
Cover IMF Working Papers
One Hundred Inflation Shocks: Seven Stylized Facts
Mr. Anil Ari, Mr. Carlos Mulas-Granados, Mr. Victor Mylonas, Mr. Lev Ratnovski, and Wei Zhao
This paper identifies over 100 inflation shock episodes in 56 countries since the 1970s, including over 60 episodes linked to the 1973–79 oil crises. We document that only in 60 percent of the episodes was inflation brought back down (or “resolved”) within 5 years, and that even in these “successful” cases resolving inflation took, on average, over 3 years. Success rates were lower and resolution times longer for episodes induced by terms-of-trade shocks during the 1973–79 oil crises. Most unresolved episodes involved “premature celebrations”, where inflation declined initially, only to plateau at an elevated level or re-accelerate. Сountries that resolved inflation had tighter monetary policy that was maintained more consistently over time, lower nominal wage growth, and less currency depreciation, compared to unresolved cases. Successful disinflations were associated with short-term output losses, but not with larger output, employment, or real wage losses over a 5-year horizon, potentially indicating the value of policy credibility and macroeconomic stability.
Keywords:
Inflation Shocks; Disinflation; Monetary Policy; 1973–79 Oil Crises; Termsof- Trade Shocks; terms-of-trade shock; inflation shock; shock episode; episode selection; involved premature celebration; Inflation; Oil prices; Fiscal stance; Global