The international economic scenario during 2015 has been
dominated by moderate euro area economic growth, financial market
volatilities, increased global uncertainties, downturn in emerging
market economies and geopolitical tensions. Despite these
challenging conditions, the euro area is on the path of moderate
recovery and has registered a higher than expected growth rate
during the first half of 2015. This was mainly due to several
temporary factors, including persistent low oil prices, euro
exchange rate depreciation and easy financing conditions through
the ECB's decision to set historically low interest rates.
According to the last economic projections by the Commission,
real GDP in the euro area is envisaged to have grown by 1.6 per
cent during 2015, in tandem with persistent deflationary pressures.
The latter is being addressed by the ECB's bond-buying program
aimed towards re-anchoring inflation expectations. Moreover, public
finances in the majority of euro
