A significant proportion of German companies expect wages to decline over the next five years as a result of using artificial intelligence, particularly for workers with less professional experience and no higher education degree, according to a survey published by Munich-based economic research institute ifo on Wednesday.
Since the previous public opinion survey conducted in October–November 2025, the share of Europeans who believe the European Union is a source of stability in today’s turbulent world has risen by 8 percentage points to 75%. In Hungary, the figure is even higher at 80%, representing a 14-percentage-point increase compared with the autumn 2025 survey, […]
More than 4.5 million tourists visited Croatia in the first five months of the year, generating over 14 million overnight stays, surpassing last year’s figures. However, demand for July and August appears somewhat weaker than in previous years, according to the Croatian National Tourist Board (HTZ).
The European Central Bank has published a broad set of decisions taken by its Governing Council in April 2026, highlighting major developments in digital finance, banking supervision, payments and financial stability across the euro area.
Piero Cipollone, a member of the Executive Board of the European Central Bank, said digitalisation and tokenisation could transform finance by making transactions faster, cheaper and more efficient through distributed ledger technology (DLT). Speaking in Rome, he argued that tokenised markets need tokenised central bank money at their core to ensure safe settlement, financial stability […]
The ECB’s Survey of Professional Forecasters for Q2 2026 shows slightly higher short-term inflation expectations, with headline inflation at 2.7% in 2026 and easing to 2.0% by 2028. Core inflation follows a similar pattern. Long-term inflation expectations (2030) remain stable at 2.0%.
The Governing Council of the European Central Bank (ECB) decided to keep all three key interest rates unchanged. It noted that recent economic data is broadly in line with previous expectations for inflation, but risks have increased: inflation risks are tilted to the upside, while growth risks are tilted to the downside. The ECB reiterated […]
Euro area consumers became more pessimistic about the economic outlook in March 2026, while inflation expectations rose significantly, according to the ECB’s latest Consumer Expectations Survey.
Euro area banks tightened lending standards across all major loan categories in the first quarter of 2026, according to the latest ECB bank lending survey, with stricter conditions driven mainly by rising economic risks and lower risk tolerance. Banks expect this trend to continue in the coming months, citing geopolitical tensions, energy market uncertainty, and […]
The European Central Bank has signed agreements with three European standard-setting bodies—European Card Payment Cooperation, nexo standards and Berlin Group—to support the rollout of digital euro payments using existing open technical standards.
