Sixpack

Ten years after the outbreak of the financial crisis it suffered, with the bank bail-in, the Republic of Cyprus has finally exited the excessive imbalances procedure (EIP) of the European Commission, on the basis of the European Union documents that were issued under the spring package of the 2023 European Semester on Wednesday in Brussels.

On 22 June 2018, the Council closed the excessive deficit procedure for France, confirming that it has reduced its deficit below the EU's 3% of GDP reference value.

The Council thereby abrogated its decision of April 2009 on the existence of an excessive deficit in France.

The European Commissioner for Economic and Financial Affairs, Taxation and Customs Pierre Moscovici stated that the Greek people had made enormous sacrifices which should not be lost. “This is a particularly symbolic moment for Greece. After so many years of sacrifices for the Greek people, the country finally reaps the fruit of its efforts”, he said.

The official statement:

European Commission released its latest review of member states' economies. 

The report, publisher as part of the European Semester review mechanism, comes after Slovenia was promoted from the group of countries with excessive imbalances in 2015.

Aside from Slovenia, the Commission on Wednesday recommended to the Council of the EU to close the excessive deficit procedure also for Cyprus and Ireland. The deficits are forecast to remain below 3% of GDP in 2016 and 2017.

Eurogroup released a statement following the meeting of European finance ministers on Monday, November 23:

The European Commission on Wednesday said it plans to introduce strict economic monitoring on Croatia, alarmed by the imbalanced state of the economy.

Stressing that the situation calls for "decisive political action and special monitoring", the Commission said a subsequent decision on activating Excessive Imbalance Procedures, known as EIP, will be made known in May.

Economic growth for the rest of 2014 in both the EU and the euro area will be weak, the European Commission said on Tuesday.

According to the Commission's autumn economic forecasts, real GDP growth for the whole of 2014 is expected to reach 1.3% in EU-28 and 0.8% in the eurozone, the EU executive body said in a press release.