"The global economy looks poised to display better growth performance in 2014. Leading indicators are pointing upward -- or at least to stability -- in major growth poles. However, for this to translate into reality policymakers will need to be nimble enough to calibrate responses to idiosyncratic challenges.Consider the United States. Job creation has accelerated since last August. Household debt is now $800 billion less than at the end of 2008, due to liquidation or refinance at lower interest rates. The current housing recovery does not seem exhausted as demand is expected to outstrip the pipeline of housing starts this year. Non-financial corporations have plenty of cash, empowering them to respond to improved prospects. Finally, the agreement in Congress on the federal budget for 2014-15, together with the political weakening of the opposition to adjustments of the public debt ceiling, point to an easing of the fiscal drag that harmed the US recovery last year.But even with these positive factors there is a challenge as the Federal Reserve starts unwinding its "quantitative easing" (QE), beginning this month with a reduction of US$10 billion in its monthly asset purchases (currently at $85 billion). Notwithstanding the limited size of this change -- when matched with the $2 trillion of assets currently held by the Fed -- as well as Fed's "forward guidance" signaling that basic interest rates will remain low for an extended period, the initially muted reaction in bond markets was followed by 10-year Treasury yields crossing the 3 percent mark at the end of 2013. As two-year yields also climbed, markets seem to believe that the Fed will be obliged to speed up the unwinding. The Fed thus must be sure to strike the right balance of actions and communication so as to avoid precocious interest rate hikes which could harm the recovery.In the Euro-area, perceived risks of a currency breakdown and a financial and economic collapse have receded substantially. Despite sticky high levels of unemployment in crisis-ridden countries, the European Central Bank (ECB) forecast of 1.1 percent (GDP growth) plus 1.1 percent (inflation) for 2014 has been taken as a signal that the bottom of the crisis has been left behind.The crisis still casts some shadows, however. The implementation of structural reforms in several member countries has fallen short. The public and private debt legacy in those countries still remains tall. Furthermore, the Euro-area institutional framework, which has now been fully recognized as essential, has not yet been refurbished enough. While the time horizon for tackling these issues will necessarily be long, there is a major immediate task to be faced by policymakers: the health check and prescriptions to which their banks will be submitted this year.The vicious circle between fiscal fragility and national banks' balance-sheet deterioration that plagued crisis-ridden member countries has been broken, thanks to fiscal adjustment programs and, especially, the ECB's promise "to do what it takes" to impede a collapse. Nevertheless, the resurgence of bank credit to the private sector -- particularly to small and medium enterprises -- will be fundamental to consolidate the recovery. Such resurgence