European banking and currency headlines

The European Union reached a landmark deal on Thursday to make the European Central Bank the bloc’s top banking supervisor, giving EU leaders greater confidence that they are gaining the upper hand over the euro zone‘s debt crisis.

EU finance ministers forged a deal on the single supervisor in the early hours of Thursday after marathon talks. Leaders will give their stamp of approval at a summit starting later in the day, their last of 2012, and also discuss closer fiscal ties for their troubled currency area.

Britain secures coveted bank union safeguards as EU economic union becomes stronger…will it all work out or are these just new headlines?

European shares edged lower and the dollar slipped against most major currencies on Thursday after the U.S. Federal Reserve announced new measures to support the world’s biggest economy.

The Fed said it would buy $45 billion of Treasuries a month on top of the $40 billion a month in mortgage-backed bonds it started buying in September. It also took the unprecedented step of indicating that interest rates would remain near zero until unemployment falls to at least 6.5 percent so long as inflation was contained

Related articles

• European ministers ink deal on bank oversight (seattlepi.com)
• Europe seeks to make progress on banking union (seattlepi.com)
• EU wrestles with banking union (bbc.co.uk)
• EU Makes ECB Oversight Deal That May Speed Bank Aid Path – Bloomberg (bloomberg.com)
• EU nations agree banking union: statement in full (telegraph.co.uk)
• European ministers ink deal on bank oversight (news.yahoo.com)