The strong and stable eurozone
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The strong and stable eurozone

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The EU has caught the rest of the world on the hop. Years of neglecting structural reform, anaemic growth, all manner of financial crises, domestic political disruption, ructions with Greece — and now divorce with the UK — have variously driven predictions of death for both the Union and the euro. It hasn’t turned out like that.

The EU has just clocked up faster growth than the US, and while the UK struggles to get its act together as it attempts Brexit, the bloc holds most, if not all, of the aces in those negotiations.

The renewed confidence in the eurozone is providing buoyant conditions for public sector bond issuers in that market. Meanwhile, no borrowers have touched sterling with a gondola pole since the UK general election last week and, although the dollar market is in fine fettle, president Donald Trump is being investigated for possible obstruction of justice, which could one day lead to his impeachment.

Whether or not anything comes of that, hopes of Trump’s plans to boost the US economy materialising are dwindling. The 10 year US Treasury yield dropped to 2.11% on Wednesday — the level it hit just after Trump’s election, but well below the highs of over 2.6% this year. Meanwhile, the 2s-10s Treasuries curve is flattening — a keen predictor of coming recession.

Prominent Brexiteer and UK Member of Parliament Jacob Rees-Mogg wrote a year ago that the EU was a “failed state” and that the euro had “crushed the economies” of Portugal, Greece, Italy and Spain.

The EU isn’t failing. It has also never been a state, but compared to it, plenty of the rest of the world looks to be getting itself into a right one.

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