In 2004, the economic policy stance has been slowly converging from the two sides of the Atlantic. In the United States, the contribution of budgetary and monetary policy to growth has slowed down. In the euro area, budgetary neutralityand less restrictive monetary conditions have less impact on GDP growth. The budget deficit of the euro area was still lower than in 2003, but remained at 2.9 % of GDP, just below the limit of 3 % established by the Stability and Growth Pact, but France, Germany, Italy and Grece had a deficit above the 3 % ceiling. The year 2004 will not have been the year of budget coordination, but it will mark a turning point in the degradation of government balances in most countries in 2001. Overall, budget policy has been more expansionary than announced in the Stability Programmes of December 2003, but has resulted in a zero budgetary impulse. Four countries belonging to the euro area (France, Germany, the Netherlands and Grece) were still the subject of an excessive deficit procedure in 2004, the suspension of which (for France and Germany) opened a dispute between the European Council and the Commission leading to a revision of the Stability and Growth Pact (SGP), resulting in a tightening of its preventional component and a relaxation of its repressive framework. Our prevision therefore interferes with a conservative interpretation of the new rules, according to which Germany (3.4 %) and Grece (3.6 %) would not succeed in reducing their deficit to the 3 % limit in 2005 and Italy (4.2 %) and Portugal (3.7 %) would also exceed this limit by increasing their balance. However, most countries would be more restrictive in their budget policy over the period 2005-2006 than in the recent past. However, the intensification of budgetary efforts in 2006 would be concentrated on the three major euro area countries. The policy-mix would therefore still be less favourable to growth, denying it the use of monetary leverage as much as the budget. In the United States, the policy mix would be more frankly restrictive than in the euro area, with a tightening of money-related conditions and a budgetary restriction. However, the american deficit (3,5 percentage points of GDP) would still be higher than in the euro area (2,6 percentage points of GDP) in 2006.