June 7 (SeeNews) - Bulgaria, Croatia and Romania are among the seven countries that do not meet all the criteria for Eurozone entry, the European Central Bank (ECB) said on Tuesday.
"The seven countries under review (Bulgaria, Croatia, Romania, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Sweden) comply with most of the quantitative economic criteria, but none of them fulfils all of the obligations laid down in the Treaty, including the legal convergence criteria," the ECB said in its convergence report.
Regarding the fiscal criteria, only Croatia is subject to an EU Council decision on the existence of an excessive deficit.
According to the report, incompatibilities persist regarding central bank independence, in particular central banks' institutional and financial independence, as well as personal independence.
"In addition, in all countries under review, with the exception of Croatia, there are incompatibilities as regards the prohibition of monetary financing and the legal integration of the respective central banks into the еurosystem," ECB added.
The euro convergence criteria are the criteria which EU members are required to meet to enter the third stage of the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) and adopt the euro as their currency. The four main criteria, include price stability, government financial position, normal fluctuation in exchange rates and long-term interest-rate levels.