Approaching Monetary Integration in the Context of the Imperative to Ensure the Sustainable Growth in the EU

Abstract

Sustainable economic growth is an essential objective at the European Union level. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of monetary integration on economic growth, assuming that the introduction of the euro significantly stimulated the process of European financial integration. We used a fixed-effects methodology for panel data for the EU 28 countries for the period 2004–2018. We find that the main factors through which monetary integration contributessignificantly and positively to economic growth areeconomic growth Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA)cards, trade, monetary freedom, convergence of interest rates, convergence of exchange rates and cross-border holdings of short-term debt, with significant differences between Eurozone and non-euro countries, which confirms the hypothesis that the introduction of the euro had a significant impact on economic and financial integration.