Eurozone

Eurozone, or euro area

Andorra Bulgaria Croatia Czech Rep. Denmark Eurozone Hungary Kosovo Monaco Monte negro Poland Romania San Marino Sweden United Kingdom Vatican   Eurozone   ERM II   Other EU members   Monetary agreement   Unilaterally adopted
Policy of	European Union
Type	Monetary union
Currency	Euro
Established	1 January 1999
Members	19 states Austria Belgium Cyprus Estonia Finland France Germany Greece Ireland Italy Latvia Lithuania Luxembourg Malta Netherlands Portugal Slovakia Slovenia Spain Future members Further usage
Governance
Political control	Eurogroup
Group president	Jeroen Dijsselbloem
Issuing authority	European Central Bank
ECB president	Mario Draghi
Statistics
Population (2016)	340 million
GDP (2015)	€10.5 trillion
Interest rate	0.00%
Inflation	0.0%
Unemployment	9.8%
Trade balance	€0.14 trillion trade deficit

The eurozone ( pronunciation ), officially called the euro area, is a monetary union of 19 of the 28 European Union (EU) member states which have adopted the euro (€) as their common currency and sole legal tender. The monetary authority of the eurozone is the Eurosystem. The other nine members of the European Union continue to use their own national currencies, although most of them are obliged to adopt the euro in future.

The eurozone consists of Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Spain. Other EU states (except for Denmark and the United Kingdom) are obliged to join once they meet the criteria to do so. No state has left, and there are no provisions to do so or to be expelled.Andorra, Monaco, San Marino, and Vatican City have formal agreements with the EU to use the euro as their official currency and issue their own coins.Kosovo and Montenegro have adopted the euro unilaterally, but these countries do not officially form part of the eurozone and do not have representation in the European Central Bank (ECB) or in the Eurogroup.