BRUSSELS, May 14 (Reuters) – The European Central Bank
clashed with Germany on Tuesday over how quickly the euro zone
should set up a full banking union, calling for it to be ready
by mid-2014 after Berlin declared it wanted a slower pace.

European Union finance ministers meeting in Brussels on
Tuesday are due to discuss plans for the banking union, which
could help the currency bloc deal with failing banks.

BRUSSELS, May 3 (Reuters) – France will get two more years
to meet its budget deficit target because of the country’s poor
economic outlook within a recession-hit euro zone, the European
Commission said on Friday.

Presenting economic forecasts for the next two years, Olli
Rehn, the European monetary affairs commissioner, also confirmed
earlier statements that Spain would get the same leeway.

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – The euro zone economy will contract by more than expected this year and budget deficits will decline more slowly, the European Commission said on Friday as it set out forecasts for the next two years.

France, Spain, Italy and the Netherlands – four of the five largest euro zone economies – will be in recession through 2013, the Commission’s forecasts showed, with only Germany, the largest euro zone economy, managing to eke out growth.

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – Throughout Europe’s debt crisis, northern European leaders have often said they will not stand for taxpayers having to fork out for other countries’ problems, and the notion of “taxpayer-funded bailouts” has taken root.

Yet despite three-and-a-half years of debt and banking turmoil, with bailouts totaling more than 400 billion euros, northern euro zone taxpayers have not actually lost a cent.

BRUSSELS, May 2 (Reuters) – Throughout Europe’s debt crisis,
northern European leaders have often said they will not stand
for taxpayers having to fork out for other countries’ problems,
and the notion of “taxpayer-funded bailouts” has taken root.

Yet despite three-and-a-half years of debt and banking
turmoil, with bailouts totalling more than 400 billion euros,
northern euro zone taxpayers have not actually lost a cent.

WASHINGTON, April 20 (Reuters) – The euro zone’s top project
to boost economic growth – banking union – will not be delayed
for now by a row over whether it needs EU law changed because
most of the work can be done before this is settled, a senior
euro zone official said on Saturday.

Jeroen Dijsselbloem, the Dutch finance minister who chairs
the monthly meetings of his euro zone colleagues, said the
dispute on the legal requirements of the banking union can go in
parallel with more technical work on how it would function.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – World financial leaders urged the European Union on Friday to quickly complete its banking union to help growth, but Germany stood firm that the next step toward such a union be through a lengthy and risky process – a change of EU law.

The banking union is one of the key projects to improve the economy of the 17 countries sharing the euro. It would help eliminate many of the problems that now hold back the flow of credit needed to finance a euro zone economic recovery.

By Jan Strupczewski and Anna Yukhananov

(Reuters) – Finance leaders of the G20 economies gathered on Friday to debate how best to rein in debt levels and the potential dangers from the latest round of aggressive easing of monetary policy from the world’s biggest central banks.

They were also poised to demand swifter resolution to setting guidelines for financial benchmarks like the Libor interest rate in the wake of a global rate-rigging scandal.

April 19 (Reuters) – Finance leaders of the G20 economies on
Friday were set to debate specific targets for reigning in debt
levels and the potential dangers from the latest round of
aggressive easing of monetary policy from the world’s biggest
central banks.

They were also poised to demand swifter resolution to
setting guidelines for financial benchmarks like the Libor
interest rate in the wake of a global rate-rigging scandal.

WASHINGTON, April 18 (Reuters) – The European Union can and
should go ahead with setting up a system for winding down banks
without trying to change EU law to give the bank resolution
mechanism a stronger legal basis, senior bloc officials said on
Thursday.

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said last
Saturday that completing the European banking union would
require changes to EU treaties, in a call that could slow
completion of the plan designed to underpin the euro currency.