Europe’s leaders have raised hopes that, when they meet Thursday and Friday in Brussels, they will agree on a banking union aimed at severing the link between the health of the euro area’s financial institutions and the solvency of its governments. The plan’s success or failure, as with so much else in the currency union today, will depend on one person: German Chancellor Angela Merkel. The euro area’s banking system has long suffered from a fundamental imbalance. Most countries have large banks whose failure would have repercussions for the entire currency union, yet the responsibility for overseeing the banks, ... (full story)