Headlines

The head of Germany’s central bank has accused Brussels of giving up on enforcing the eurozone’s economic rules, in a powerful attack on the European Commission, the Financial Times reported. Jens Weidmann, president of the Bundesbank, said the only way of disciplining high-spending governments in the single currency area was now through the markets. “My perception is that the European Commission has basically given up on enforcing the rules of the Stability and Growth Pact,” Mr Weidmann said on Friday.

Britain’s first budget plan since the Brexit vote will not include a big new spending push because of “eye-wateringly” high public debt levels, but will have some help for the economy and struggling families, the UK’s chancellor of the exchequer has said, the Irish Times reported. Philip Hammond, who will spell out the economic priorities of the new government on Wednesday, said on Sunday he wanted to keep some fiscal “head-room” as two years of negotiations about leaving the EU approach.

The Central Bank’s key decision-making board is due to consider changes to its controversial mortgage lending rules next Wednesday, with some significant alterations to the existing regime likely to be announced afterwards, the Irish Times reported. The Central Bank Commission – effectively the board of the bank – will be asked to consider proposals designed to increase the flow of lending, particularly to first-time buyers. However the bulk of the rules will remain, with senior Central Bank figures arguing that they are essential in order to underpin a sustainable market.

Greece’s finance minister Euclid Tsakalotos believes Greece has a good chance of escaping its seemingly endless debt crisis by 2018 – provided it gets a helping hand in coming months from Germany over debt relief, the International Monetary Fund over austerity, and the European Central Bank on bond-buying, The Wall Street Journal Real Time Brussels blog reported. If the eurozone continues to delay the resolution of festering problems such as the Greek debt question, then more voters will conclude that Europe’s existing political order isn’t working, he argued.

Elevated house prices and record-high debt levels are contributing to worries about Canada’s future economic growth, the head of the country’s national housing agency says, The Wall Street Journal reported. Speaking at the Bank of England on Friday, Canada Mortgage & Housing Corp. President Evan Siddall said high house prices in the cities of Vancouver and Toronto have spread to other markets. At the same time, household indebtedness has grown and the concentration of Canadians’ net worth in real estate is near historic highs.

After years of turbo-driven central bank stimulus, most Europeans still want to leave their spare cash in savings accounts, even if those accounts pay zero interest, Bloomberg News reported. That’s the finding of a survey by Europe’s biggest debt collector, Stockholm-based Intrum Justitia AB. “After the financial crisis, people have felt a need -- even if they have small means -- to create some kind of security,” Chief Executive Officer Mikael Ericson said in an interview in Stockholm on Nov. 16.

Officials in one of China’s hottest property markets have banned developers from borrowing money to buy land, as local governments embrace increasingly drastic measures to curb soaring home prices, the Financial Times reported. Prices of new residential properties in Nanjing were up 40 per cent year on year in September, in line with increases in other big cities such as Beijing and Shanghai. Over recent months, local governments have tried to cool residential property prices by making it more difficult for people to buy homes.

Greece’s finance minister warned Germany and other creditors to agree on a debt restructuring in coming weeks, or miss the best chance to bring his struggling country’s seven-year crisis to an end. Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos’s comments, in an interview with The Wall Street Journal, came a day after U.S. President Barack Obama visited Athens, where he backed calls for Greek debt relief. Mr. Obama continued his European trip in Berlin on Thursday. German leaders including finance chief Wolfgang Schäuble have said Greece’s debt can be addressed at a later date. Mr.

Good times are rolling again in Iceland. In June it beat England in a football match. On The Economist’s “glass-ceiling index”, it is the world’s best country for working women. And the economy is purring. After a thumping crash in 2008-09, GDP is expected to grow by 5% this year, faster than any other rich economy. The ruling (conservative) Independence Party has been rewarded: it won 30% of the vote in the election in October, more than any other party. But some fret that Iceland’s economic stability is, again, built on molten lava.

A severe and prolonged economic depression could result in a 25% decline in Canadian house prices by 2021, Canada’s national housing agency says, The Wall Street Journal reported. The estimate was included in a report on stress testing conducted by the Canada Mortgage & Housing Corporation and released publicly on Thursday. While the agency’s base case scenario is for Canadian house prices to rise about 9.0% between 2017 and 2021, it said several extreme situations could result in price declines over the same period.