A NEW Scottish currency is a "serious option" if voters opt for independence next year, a panel of leading economists has found.

The group - including past and present members of Alex Salm-ond's council of economic advis-ers and the Scottish Government's chief economist - said a new curr-ency would have to be the "default option" if a newly independent Scotland had currency talks with the rest of the UK.

They said the option would have to be pursued if an independent Scotland failed to secure the First Minister's favoured arrangement of sharing the pound in a formal monetary union with the UK.

The conclusion emerged from a top-level seminar in July organised by the Royal Society of Edinburgh and the British Academy. Their official report on the meeting is published today.

It comes as a separate report, commissioned by the pro- independence Options for Scotland think tank and the left-leaning Reid Foundation, concluded that a new currency would be viable and would avoid "ceding control over monetary policy" to London or Frankfurt.

Among the seven experts who gave presentations in the Royal Society of Edinburgh and British Academy seminar were Dr Gary Gillespie, the Scottish Govern-ment's chief economist, Professor Frances Ruane, a member of the Mr Salmond's council of economic advisers, and Professor John Kay, a former member of the same panel.

The official report of the meeting says: "It was suggested that having an independent currency is a serious option for an independent Scotland.

"On the subject of the negotiation of a monetary union with the UK, it was suggested that this would only be possible to conduct on the basis that the independent currency was the default option, which would be pursued if acceptable terms of the monetary union failed."

Mr Salmond has insisted that a satisfactory currency union would be negotiated because it would be in the interests of both Scotland's and the rest of the UK, despite claims such an arrange-ment - if it did prove acceptable to the UK - would severely restrict an independent Scottish Government's economic policies.

He has resisted calls to outline a "Plan B" in case talks failed.

Today's report dismisses other possible options - joining the euro or using the pound without agreement with Westminster - as "not credible". But it warns of a "likelihood" the UK Government would use its large shareholding in RBS to order it to headquarter itself in London, as part of any currency union deal.

In the Options for Scotland/Reid Foundation report, economists Jim and Margaret Cuthbert back the idea of creating a new currency.

They wrote: "The basic choice for an independent Scotland as regards monetary policy would be whether it wanted to control its own monetary policy, in which case it would need to have its own currency, or whether to opt for some arrangement like membership of a currency union, or operating a currency peg, both of which would involve ceding control over monetary policy."