FRANKFURT (MNI) – A “well designed” macro-economic insurance
mechanism for the Eurozone would help to underpin confidence, help
eliminate “idiosyncratic risk” and demonstrate greater cohesion and
solidarity, European Central Bank Governing Council member Athanasios
Orphanides said on Wednesday.
“The role of stability insurance is to protect a member state
against the idiosyncratic shocks that might otherwise create doubts
about its ability to honour debt obligations in the future and
unnecessarily raise its financing costs for a long time,” Orphanides
said at an event here.
“On their own, each member state faces some risk of this nature.
But, to a large extent, each risk can be pooled by an insurance
mechanism, thus eliminating idiosyncratic risk,” he added.
In this situation, Orphanides explained, the insurance would take
the form of loans available for EMU members who suffer from difficulties
in obtaining market financing.
“Loans are not gifts,” Orphanides stressed. “An insurance mechanism
is not a transfer union.”
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