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FEDERAL RESERVE BANK OF NEW YORK Volume 20, Number 2 ? 2014 ? /research/current_issues I N E C O N O M I C S A N D F I N A N C E The Balance of Payments Crisis in the Euro Area Periphery Matthew Higgins and Thomas Klitgaard Countries in the euro area periphery borrowed heavily from abroad in the years leading up to the sovereign debt crisis, largely to finance increased consumption and housing investment. When the crisis hit in 2010, capital flight by private investors forced these countries to bring domestic spending back into line with domestic incomes—the same adjustment required of countries facing a typical balance of payments crisis. Nevertheless, adjustment to the pullback of private capital was not as harsh as might have been expected, owing to the workings of the euro area’s system for managing cross-border payment imbalances between regional commercial banks. This system, known as Target2, offset much of the capital flight with credits extended collectively by euro area central banks to central banks in the periphery. The euro area sovereign debt crisis started with Greece in early 2010 and soon spread to other “periphery” countries such as Portugal, Spain, and Italy. Evi-dence that the Greek crisis stemmed from an unsustainable fiscal situation led many observers to believe that fiscal mismanagement underlay the problems in these other countries as well. An alternative interpretation, however, traces the crisis in the periphery to an excessive reliance on foreign capital. Periphery countries were borrowing heavily from abroad before 2010 to support domestic consumption and housing booms. When foreign investors became unwilling to extend new credit, periphery countries faced wrenching adjustment pressures. In particular, the withdrawal of private capital forced these countries to bring total domestic spending—govern-ment and private—more closely into line with domestic incomes. However, the tightening in credit conditions in the periphery econo