In the context of the intensified euro-area sovereign debt crisis, the European Commission launched a consultation on the feasibility of common issuance of sovereign bonds among the Member States of the euro area.
“Stability Bonds” are regarded as a potentially powerful instrument to address the current liquidity constraints in several euro-area Member States and to ultimately reinforce financial stability in the euro area. The consultation is exploring various options for the issuance of such bonds and investigating the pre-conditions.
Methodology
All CFA Institute members in the European Union and Switzerland were invited to participate in an online survey to collect their opinion on the introduction of Stability Bonds and to inform CFA Institute feedback to the European Commission. 15,297 members with a valid email address received the email invitation for the survey on 20 December 2011 and one reminder was sent to non-respondents on 28 December 2011. The survey was closed at 12:00p.m. EST on 4 January 2012. 798 members responded for an overall response rate of 5% and a margin of error of ± 1.62%.