Christine Lagarde, President of the European Central Bank, criticized the barriers that still exist in the Eurozone that make investments between member countries difficult. Regulatory, fiscal, and administrative restrictions continue to prevent European savers from freely investing in other countries in the single currency area.
According to data highlighted by Lagarde, since 2014 the obstacles that a saver faces when investing in another Eurozone country have halved compared to the obstacles to investment in the United States. However, this reduction has not been enough to eliminate the significant differences between investing internally in Europe and investing across borders within the Eurozone itself.
Lagarde's criticism comes in the context of debates on the need to deepen the Capital Markets Union, a project that aims to facilitate the flow of investments between European countries. The persistence of these barriers limits Europeans' investment options and contributes to lesser integration of European financial markets compared to the North American market.
