Economy of the European Union

A Cypriot official says other nations using the euro currency have approved his country’s next installment of rescue money amounting to 350 million euros.

That happened during a meeting in Brussels on Thursday.

The nine EU countries which were supposed to make extra contributions to the EU budget by December 1, 2014, were granted a postponement by September 1, 2015 on Friday.

Friday's decision of the finance and economy ministers of the 28 EU Member States stipulated an opportunity for making the payments in installments.

Croatia's government, headed by the Minister of Social Policies and Youth, Milanka Opacic, is pushing ahead with drafting a decree that will scrap the poorest people's debts to banks, communal services and telecommunications firms.

The head of the Eurogroup, Jeroen Dijsselbloem, said on Thursday that eurozone finance ministers are behind the idea of providing Greece with the financial support that would allow it to exit its bailout at the end of the year without requiring further funding from the International Monetary Fund.

The European Central Bank aims to increase the size of its balance sheet toward the levels of 2012, ECB President Mario Draghi said on Thursday, repeating language that has annoyed some policymakers at the bank by essentially setting a target for the expansion.

The euro edged higher and European stocks pulled back on Thursday as investors waited to see what message ECB chief Mario Draghi will send after the European Central Bank's monthly meeting, following another run of poor eurozone data.

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The European Commission said it expected Romania's budget deficit to reach 2.1 per cent of GDP this year, rising to to 2.8 per cent next year, if the government does not increase taxes or cut spending in the meantime.

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Greece's biggest telecom operator OTE posted a 2 percent fall in third-quarter core profit on Thursday, hurt by lower network revenues in Romania and competition in its austerity-hit home market.

Greece’s statistics service (ELSTAT) said on Wednesday that the country’s economy shrank by 3.9 percent last year, correcting a previous revised estimate for 2013 gross domestic product issued in October.

Revised data released by ELSTAT on October 10 had shown a 3.3 percent GDP contraction last year.

 European Commission matches the government’s forecast for growth

The European Commission’s latest report backs government forecasts for a Greek economic turnaround, and Brussels is determined to help the country emerge from its adjustment program, as new Economic and Monetary Affairs Commissioner Pierre Moscovici stated on Tuesday, underlining the importance of the reform process.