Brugge 🇧🇪 — September 2025

Thank you to all who joined us in Cologne this week for the 2nd Max Planck Summer School for Women in Political Economy! A fantastic line-up of speakers and participants, thoughtful discussions and global perspectives. Huge thanks to organizers @palmapolyak.bsky.social and @dustinvoss.bsky.social!

Köln 🇩🇪 — September 2025

How do domestic institutions shape trade liberalization? Read Kim, Nao, and Sasaki’s recent @apsrjournal.bsky.social publication for a new measure of product-level geographic concentration and some sugary case studies to find out! 🍭◽🍬⤵️

Cornelia Woll wrapped up a great day 1 of the Max Planck Institute’s Summer School for Women in Political Economy with her keynote lecture on “Economic Statecraft and Negotiated Justice in Global Markets”

Ciak, si gira! 🎬🩵👑

Banco Bpm is now considering a merger with Crédit Agricole #ItalianBanksWatch www.corriere.it/economia/fin...

Vancouver 🇨🇦 — September/Septembre 2025

Overheard in Canada: “The hardest part about getting from Cologne to Vancouver is getting to Frankfurt.” 😂

Off again! #APSAbound

Plot twist: Monte dei Paschi now has control of Mediobanca #ItalianBanksWatch (I'm switching things up with a French source) www.lemonde.fr/economie/art...

A reminder to be very careful in fact-checking history with AI. In checking some archival sources today, I went to verify an acronym with Google and the (unprompted) AI overview I was given is flat-out incorrect. Stay vigilant!

Spain's National Securities commission has approved BBVA's hostile takeover of Sabadell #SpanishBanksWatch elpais.com/economia/202...

Thanks to the Junior Scholars in Quantitative Conflict Workshop for hosting me tonight to discuss my sanctions research! Nothing I’d rather do for 90 min on a Thursday night 😅. I appreciate the supportive comments on how I can make the research & presentation better 🫶🏻 Thanks again to the organizers!

"WTO analysis suggests that roughly 72 per cent of global goods trade is still operating on basic “most favoured nation” (MFN) tariff terms...[The WTO] system is showing resilience."-WTO chief Okonjo-Iweala www.ft.com/content/344e...

Congrats to @boesevanessa.bsky.social on winning an ERC Starting Grant for her work on waves of regime transformation!!!! 🎉🥳🎉🙌👏 idw-online.de/en/news857648

I'm taking @simonkuper.bsky.social's advice in @catherinedevries.bsky.social's "Etched in Marble" blog to read "Politics and the English Language" by Orwell. Join me! www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-f...

Budapest 🇭🇺 — August 2025

Nothing like working so late on a Saturday in August that you almost get locked in @bogatyrev.bsky.social

I ❤️ inter-library loan! Thanks to some library in Germany for sending this to me in Italy (& saving the countdown to my prospectus)

Back to business as usual (and buying a lot of fruit for less than €5)

A big shout out to the strangers from the Philippines, Peru, and Slovakia who saw me struggling with all my bags in the rain at the tram stop. They not only saved my day but swapped stories of how we ended up in Milano!

Arrived in Milano to a 🌈! 😊

Thanks, DC! Until next time 🫡

Today's fun Friday read 😃 www.ft.com/content/75b7...

"The Baltic case offers a clear lesson: once Russia gains control, the cost of reversing it may be measured in decades of human suffering." - the foreign ministers of 🇱🇹🇱🇻🇪🇪 in today's FT www.ft.com/content/7c57...

Feels apt for this week

A Corriere update on how Mediobanca's voting on the Banca Generali purchase is going #ItalianBanksWatch www.corriere.it/economia/fin...

For anyone else who was following @mcopelov.bsky.social and @tompepinsky.com's great debate on cryptocurrencies and fiat/sovereign currencies, they made a paper out of it and the new draft is out! "The Political Economy of Sh*tcoins" papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Well well well…if it isn’t economic statecraft

Holding everyone at Emory in my heart right now 💔 Please pray 🕯️🙏

Shitcoins or stablecoins? Replacement for fiat currencies or rival? How can we understand the political economy of cryptocurrencies & its implications for global finance, state sovereignty, & the international system? 🧵 & our new paper with @tompepinsky.com: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

It looks like Mediobanca is moving forward with purchasing Banca Generali (and avoiding being bought by Monte dei Paschi di Siena) #ItalianBanksWatch www.ft.com/content/8429...

A 🧵 of today's best #ArchiveQuotesoftheDay! (Today was a fun one 😃)

This is overall bad news on investments from the @oecd-ocde.bsky.social, but surprisingly good news for 🇮🇹🇭🇷🇱🇹🇬🇷 www.ft.com/content/67a6...

A fun read this Friday! 🇱🇹 www.ft.com/content/3a9d...

Weirdly, I can't find this reported in UK media, but the UK has sanctioned 25 entities related to human smuggling. I'm flagging it as someone who researches both human trafficking & sanctions (separately, not together)! www.lemonde.fr/internationa...

UniCredit has withdrawn its offer for BPM #ItalianBanksWatch www.repubblica.it/economia/202...

If I weren't so busy, I might attempt this myself, but flagging for others: politicalsciencenow.com/call-for-pap... PS is looking for special issue submissions on 🇺🇸 trade in the 21st century

Sinéad Bovell this morning with an important discussion of how a post-reality world is colliding with a post-truth one. "Moving through societal issues requires consensus. Consensus requires overlapping facts... Our democracy...now feels more brittle." open.substack.com/pub/sineadbo...

Happy Friday from the European Reading Room 😊📚

The view from my office for the next few weeks 🤩 I’m excited to be living my National Treasure dreams, listen to the Lincoln film soundtrack, and get a lot of data/writing work done! ✍️

The headline is noteworthy, but buried is the fact that the 🇮🇹 admin court ruled against some of the Meloni government's requirements for the first time. Remember that the BPM takeover is connected to the Commerzbank bid (which started this all) #ItalianBanksWatch www.ft.com/content/bfba...

FT's The new age of geoeconomics: "Some social scientists might scoff, pointing out that politics has always shaped economics to some degree." www.ft.com/content/762c... I am one of those social scientists 😉

#ItalianBanksWatch irl at Bocconi! I am surrounded by bankers and carabinieri on my espresso break, where I am dressed in jeans and sneakers before a ✈️ for the occasion

Starting Monday morning with some shameless self-promotion: My Bocconi CV has been updated for the first time in a while! So if you're interested in what I've been up to recently (working papers, field work, datasets, etc.), you can find it here 👉 www.unibocconi.it/sites/defaul...

I think I should start a #SpanishBanksWatch 🇪🇸 thread too elpais.com/economia/202...

Madrid 🇪🇸 — June 2025