It's all Greek to me

the first one to default will get the biggest heat but will have clearly an advantage - because ultimately everybody will default. so why to load citizens with the debt service. let's play another hand...:D

p.s. from this perspective i do not understand why gold is not above 10,000 already.
 
From http://english.capital.gr/ :

Le Monde Discloses Euro-Rescue For Greece

European states are planning to help Greece so as to avoid a budgetary disaster, French daily Le Monde reports Thursday on its Web site.

"According to our sources, different governments, including France and Germany, are looking, in consultation with European authorities, at the details of a mechanism to give financial support to Athens," the newspaper reports.

In return the states will demand that Greek intensifies its consolidation plan, the paper says.

German Ministry of Finance dismissed the story, while Greek officials said that EU wants Greece to solve its own problems.

"We reject this report," finance ministry spokeswoman Jeanette Schwamberger told Dow Jones Newswires.

The news agency also quotes a Greek government source as saying that EU Wants Greece To Solve Own Problems and that there are “No Signs Of EU Bailout For Greece.”

Meanwhile, an European Commission spokeswoman said she would "not comment on fictuous reports of speculative nature."


And

China Shouldn’t Buy Greek Debt, Yu Says

China shouldn’t buy a large portion of Greek government debt to help rescue the country because the securities are more risky compared to U.S. Treasuries, Yu Yongding, a former adviser to the Chinese central bank told Bloomberg

“It is unreasonable for an economist to support a diversification away from an unsafe asset class to a much more unsafe asset class,” Yu said in an e-mailed response to questions of Bloomberg. “Let European governments and the European Central Bank rescue Greece.”

“Even if pricing is attractive, one key problem for Greek government bonds is the lack of credibility,” Yu said. “We trust U.S. statistics on debt and deficits. The numbers are not pretty but we have a pretty good idea, so we would know what we are buying. In contrast, Greece’s statistics have been sharply criticized by the European Commission.”
 
in other words; when chinese buy shit they want to know what you had for a dinner - interesting perspective on investing.
 
Quote from dhpar:

in other words; when chinese buy shit they want to know what you had for a dinner - interesting perspective on investing.

The most spot on analysis I have seen all week.
 
Quote from Ivanovich:

So what do the folks here think? I give it a 50/50 chance now that the EU will cave and bail out Greece. Given that the cost of insuring Greek debt against default is now at a record high, the rumblings in the news are that Brussels is considering bailing it out. They may have learned the lesson from the Lehman episode of what happens when you don't bail out the dead weight.

Of course then there's the issue of who else will line up for a bailout once you set precedence, AND the fact that Germans might be a tad put out about bailing out Greeks.

It's one thing to see how mad the American public gets when it has to bail out American banks on Wall Street. But what happens when somewhat fiscally responsible Germans are faced with paying for Greek social programs? Sure, we're all one EU, but does Nationalism ever come into that?

Good post and questions.

I suspect a bailout is likely as modern economic thought and order
and Global agenda require adhesion and adherence over national sovereignty.
I do also suspect that Nationalism will spark turbulence;
however my concern is "SupraNationalism" in economic reform in the EU and, albeit slim,
a return to the doctrine of Charlemagne and the risk of a Fourth Reich.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supranationalism

This guy might be one to keep an eye on as the EU takes shape:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl-Theodor_zu_Guttenberg
 
Quote from Ivanovich:

Have you been to Greece? I'd move there! Santorini is right up my alley.

Hell everyday! lol


how's the high speed access out there I wonder? Does get pretty quiet in the winter. Maybe just a season home:D
 
ECB prepares legal ground for euro rupture as Greek crisis escalates



Fears of a euro break-up have reached the point where the European
Central Bank feels compelled to issue a legal analysis of what would
happen if a country tried to leave monetary union.

By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
Published: 5:12PM GMT 17 Jan 2010

“Recent developments have, perhaps, increased the risk of secession
(however modestly), as well as the urgency of addressing it as a
possible scenario,” said the document, entitled Withdrawal and
expulsion from the EU and EMU: some reflections.

The author makes a string of vaulting, Jesuitical, and mischievous
claims, as EU lawyers often do. Half a century of ever-closer union
has created a “new legal order” that transcends a “largely obsolete
concept of sovereignty” and imposes a “permanent limitation” on the
states’ rights.

Those who suspect that European Court has the power pretensions of the
Medieval Papacy will find plenty to validate their fears in this
astonishing text.

Crucially, he argues that eurozone exit entails expulsion from the
European Union as well. All EU members must take part in EMU (except
Britain and Denmark, with opt-outs).

This is a warning shot for Greece, Portugal, Ireland and Spain. If
they fail to marshal public support for draconian austerity, they risk
being cast into Icelandic oblivion. Or for Greece, back into the
clammy embrace of Asia Minor.

ECB chief Jean-Claude Trichet upped the ante, warning that the bank
would not bend its collateral rules to support Greek debt. “No state
can expect any special treatment,” he said. He might as well daub a
death’s cross on the door of Greece’s debt management office.

This euro-brinkmanship must be unnerving for the Hellenic Socialists
(PASOK). Last week’s €1.6bn (£1.4bn) auction of Greek debt did not go
well. The interest rate on six-month notes rose to 1.38pc, compared to
0.59pc a month ago. The yield on 10-year bonds has touched 6pc, the
spreads ballooning to 270 basis points above German Bunds.

Greece cannot afford such a premium for long. The country must raise
€54bn this year – front-loaded in the first half. Unless the spreads
fall sharply, the deficit cannot be cut from 12.7pc of GDP to 3pc of
GDP within three years. As Moody’s put it, Greece (and Portugal) faces
the risk of “slow death” from rising interest costs.

Stephen Jen from BlueGold Capital said the design flaws of monetary
union are becoming clearer. “I don’t believe Euroland will break up:
too much political capital has been spent in the past half century for
Euroland to allow an outright breakage. However, severe
'stress-fractures’ are quite likely in the years ahead.”

As Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece, and Spain (PIIGS) slide into
deflation, their “real” interest rates will rise even higher. “It is
tantamount to hiking rates in the already weak PIIGS,” he said. This
is the crux. ECB policy will become “pro-cyclical”, too tight for the
South, too loose for the North.

The City view is that the North-South split may cause trouble, but
that there will always be a bail-out to prevent a domino effect. “If a
rescue turns out to be necessary, a rescue will be mounted,” said
Marco Annunziata from Unicredit.

It comes down to a bet that Berlin will do for Club Med what it did
for East Germany: subsidise forever. It is a judgement on whether EMU
is the binding coin of sacred solidarity, or just a fixed exchange
rate system like others before it.

Politics will decide, and in Greece it is already proving messy as
teams of “inspectors” ruffle feathers. The Orthodox LAOS party is not
happy that an EU crew dared to demand an accounting from the colonels.
“The Ministry of Defence is sacrosanct,” it said.

Greece alone in Western Europe treats the military budget as a state
secret. Rating agencies guess it is a ruinous 5pc of GDP. Does the
country really need 1,700 battle tanks, 420 combat jets, and eight
submarines? To fight NATO ally Turkey? Merely to pose the question is
to enter dangerous waters.

Who knows what the IMF surveillance team made of their mission in
Athens. The Fund’s formula for boom-bust countries that squander their
competitiveness is to retrench AND devalue. But devaluation is ruled
out. Greece must take the pain, without the cure.

The policy is conceptually foolish and arguably cynical. It is to
bleed a society in order to uphold the ideology of the European
Project. Greece’s national debt will be 120pc of GDP this year. S&P
says it will reach 138pc by 2012. A fiscal squeeze – without any
offsetting monetary or exchange stimulus – will cause tax revenues to
collapse. Debt will rise higher on a shrinking economic base.

Even if Greece can cut wages without setting off mass protest, it
lacks the open economy and export sector that may yet save Ireland in
similar circumstances. Greece is caught in a textbook deflation trap.

Labour minister Andreas Loverdos says unemployment would reach a
million this year – or 22pc, equal to 30m in the US. He broadcast the
fact with a hint of menace, as if he wanted Europe to squirm. Two can
play brinkmanship.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/...r-euro-rupture-as-Greek-crisis-escalates.html
 
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