Central Europe

Slovenia hosted the European Central Bank’s monthly meeting last week, bringing the focus of Europe’s media onto its own financial problems. The country’s benchmark nine-year bond yields around 6 percent–down from about 7 percent during August, the level at which...

The armies of Europe may soon be on the run as the debt crisis forces politicians to rethink military spending. The cuts being driven through by cash-strapped governments, although they have been announced piecemeal, may force a redesign of the...

UPDATE The European Central Bank cut its benchamrk rate to a record low of 0.75 percent and cut the deposit rate to zero. —- The European Central Bank is expected to cut its benchmark interest rate below 1 percent today...

Germany’s Angela Merkel is hunting for alternatives to her austerity mantra. She needs a new message after her line was eclipsed by French President Francois Hollande’s election on a push-for-growth agenda. Among the proposals lined up by Merkel’s advisers, Der...

One European bank that is getting ready for a wave of clients withdrawing money, spooked by uncertainty over Greece’s future in the euro ahead of the country’s elections on June 17, is Austria’s Raiffeisen Bank International AG. The bank has...

So much for having a currency outside the euro. Hungary sold just three quarters of the one-year Treasury bills it planned to today and the average yield rose to 9.96 percent. That’s an increase of more than 200 basis points...