The financial markets have sent a strong signal of confidence in the euro, indicating they believe it has been extremely well planned and the governments and community institutions involved have been relatively surefooted. I do not underestimate the potential problems of Euroland. I believe our political leaders are right to accentuate the positives, however, in the interests of launching the euro with confidence and optimism. They need to be prepared to handle crises as and when they occur, but not necessarily to dwell on hypothetical problems in advance. Most of the political and technical issues have been hammered out, some of them after arduous debate.
Some important issues remain to be resolved before the euro has landed.
How to represent the EMU abroad, for example, is a complex and politically sensitive issue that remains to be thrashed out, hopefully at the next European Council summit in Vienna in December if the Austrian Presidency have their way. Unlike monetary policy, which will be unified under EMU, fiscal and macroeconomic policy will remain in the hands of national governments. The logic of EMU, however, implies a high degree of convergence of economic policy in Euroland. It also implies considerable solidarity among the member states. Contrary to the view of some observers, however, the small size of the Union budget itself is not necessarily an impediment.