Inflation targeting once seemed sufficient, but the Global Crisis showed that maintaining financial stability and price stability requires more than the monetary-policy tool. We are witnessing the rise of macroprudential policy. This column discusses how monetary and macroprudential policies interact and what it means for policy and institutional design. Regardless of whether both policies are assigned to the same authority or to two authorities; separate decision-making, accountability and communication structures are required.

Eurozone banking union discussions are full of questions about the scope of Eurozone microprudential bank supervision. Yet, this column argues that there is surprisingly little debate on the macroprudential supervision that is necessary to safeguard the wider European financial system. After all it is macro developments, such as fast rising housing prices, that lie at the heart of the ongoing crisis in Europe. To safeguard the financial system, Eurozone macroprudential tools should be under the ECB, separate from microprudential functions, with input from national central banks when differentiation is necessary.

Macroprudential policy is meant to reduce the risks from the financial sector spilling over to the wider economy. But the debate over how to do so goes on. This column argues that macroprudential policy can be analysed through the prism of market failures that it is supposed to address.

In the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, there has been burgeoning interest in macroprudential policy as an overarching framework to address the stability of the financial system as a whole rather than only its individual components. This column, based on a new dataset from 49 countries, shows that some macroprudential instruments are effective in reducing procyclicality in the financial system, and thus systemic risks.