Greece And The Eu

[Malcolm Robinson]

They just look cuddly fluffy things, in reality..........

[Malcolm Robinson]

With the latest downgrading of Greek bonds and their ban on shorting financials it looks like the futility of the ECB/IMF rescue plan is becoming apparent. It would seem Greece is about to bear the brunt of the abject failure of the political class to do anything constructive in sorting out the fiscal problems this country has and looking at Portugal's downgrading contagion is starting.

Let us not forget just why this has become such a problem. Had the politicians grasped the full extent of what was going to happen then maybe a real deal could have been done to negate the full effects Greece will now have to face. Even at the eleventh hour the latest 'rescue plan' is unworkable and doesn't provide the quick, reactive and decisive measures needed to really help Greece. I think there is a very salient lesson in there for us! Greece is about to pay for the folly of allowing the Eurocrats too much self induced importance.

Spain, Italy, Portugal, Ireland, take a pin and see which one will be next to be targeted for having unrealistic fiscal policies. That same pin might just land a bit closer to home of course..........

[Stephen]

With the latest downgrading of Greek bonds and their ban on shorting financials it looks like the futility of the ECB/IMF rescue plan is becoming apparent. It would seem Greece is about to bear the brunt of the abject failure of the political class to do anything constructive in sorting out the fiscal problems this country has and looking at Portugal's downgrading contagion is starting.

Let us not forget just why this has become such a problem. Had the politicians grasped the full extent of what was going to happen then maybe a real deal could have been done to negate the full effects Greece will now have to face. Even at the eleventh hour the latest 'rescue plan' is unworkable and doesn't provide the quick, reactive and decisive measures needed to really help Greece. I think there is a very salient lesson in there for us! Greece is about to pay for the folly of allowing the Eurocrats too much self induced importance.

Spain, Italy, Portugal, Ireland, take a pin and see which one will be next to be targeted for having unrealistic fiscal policies. That same pin might just land a bit closer to home of course..........

Malcolm, I don't disagree with what you say about the Eurocrats but ultimately Greece is responsible for the terrible situation it is in and there is a lesson for the UK in this.

[Malcolm Robinson]

Stephen,

I agree Greece has to shoulder a lot of blame for its predicament and seeing the past government trying to blame the current one for all their woes is hypocrisy on a staggering scale.

However, they did hand control of their currency over to the ECB who said they were competent enough to handle it. What we have seen is complete incompetence at ECB level to charge Greece with getting its house in order years ago. This is the problem now, it's not the speculators, who governments are trying to blame, it's the lack of policy by the ECB which has made a difficult situation dire.

This is a wildfire and none knows where it will go of if it will stop. Trichet trying to woo German voters in an attempt to gain Merkel some political credence for her immanent elections is a step too far. The Dutch have said they won't pay up and why should they because like German workers the Greek pensions are seen as flights of fantasy! Most of the 'Northern' members of EMU have said the same and for this bale out to work each country has to ratify any aid in their own national parliaments.

All the while this prevarication is going on Greece is getting into a deeper and deeper mess. They are now issuing IOU's to private sector providers to the public sector! They need the IMF to go in unilaterally with deep enough pockets to get Greece back into positive trading terms, probably 5 years at least. Either that or Greece should take charge of her own affairs and take some very bold decisions.

[Malcolm Robinson]

What we are seeing at the moment in the Hellenistic area could well spread over into world banking and we might yet see 'Lehman2' as financial crises often have implications in unexpected places.

Standard and Poors rerating of Greek and Portuguese bonds gave the fragile market the skitters and for once we saw an immediate reaction. Looking a bit closer and trying to see what possible ramifications this has for world banking we have seen, for the last 2 years, the ECB rewriting their own collateral rules so the likes of Greek (say) banks could borrow money off the ECB at 1% and buy government bonds which returned about 7%. Happy days for bankers and they have made about 4B Euros performing this trick. So with this 'free' money going begging who wanted in on the action, the rest of the banking fraternity. That Greek bank which the French bank, CA, almost completely owns saw its share price almost half yesterday! The French exposure, 79B Euros at the end of 2009! The statement put out by the French central bank Governor saying they had little exposure would seem a tad under representative but does show why gratuitous statements of this sort are maybe more intended in propping up French bond sales! Incidentally German exposure, in the same report, said they had about 45B Euros worth and may well explain their harder line with Greece. Other countries we might examine were Portugal and Ireland with 9.8B and 8.6B Euros respectfully. These are not insignificant amounts given then size of their economies and their own fiscal difficulties. It might also be worth considering that the likes of Portugal is being asked to take part in the Greek ECB bailout and lending to them at 5% whilst her own bonds are above that figure! Anyone else see yet another major flaw in ECB policy thinking and that isn't even considering the recent bale out the Irish banks have had! It's shambolic really! Considering just how financial markets were baled out in the recent global meltdown are we about to see a new wave of QE applied? Whatever happens it looks likely some sort of haircut will be applied to Greek debts with some analysists talking of up to 50%. If that happens a lot of European banks will in effect become insolvent due to their exposure and the knock on effects will impact globally. Anyone who thinks this is entirely a Greek or even EU problem needs to look under the skin a bit more. Brown's agreement to increasing the UK exposure to IMF funding, even after rewording the actual sentences, would lead us into thinking the UK is taking part from a position of fiscal strength, nothing could be further from the truth, but like I said once you start the printing presses you quickly become addicted!!!!!!!

[threegee]

Malcolm, I don't disagree with what you say about the Eurocrats but ultimately Greece is responsible for the terrible situation it is in and there is a lesson for the UK in this.

And the lesson is: that the ice is a lot thinner than Gordon deludes himself it is! We can't go on running up debt under the illusion that "the recession" is coming to an end. It's not even a recession; it's a "repressed depression" - repressed by printing money which will, as sure as night turns into day, turn into roaring inflation.

Cameron is right and Brown/Darling + Cable are wrong! We've got to stop spending and make a start at reducing the Brown debt legacy right away. There's no fairy-godmother around the corner, and Treasury growth forecasts are just plain potty! The best we can hope for is to bump along the bottom for several more years, with all that implies.

I don't actually think that Darling is quite as deluded as Brown. If he were to continue as chancellor (which he wont now on any result as Gordon wants rid of him at the first opportunity) he'd already have started trying to restore some of our credibility. The election has got in the way; but then if it wasn't for the election he'd already have been side-lined for daring to disagree with our very own "Great Leader".

A hung parliament with the LDs voting against tough measures and expecting their tax give-aways as a condition of support is the last (OK second-last) thing we need!

[Malcolm Robinson]

So Professor Roubini has come out and said he thinks there could be as much as 8% of EU GDP at risk if the ECB decided to bale out all of its members immediate debt problems. This is about 600B Euros! He also warns of contagion saying Greece is 'just the tip of the iceberg' and can easily see the rest of world banking drawn into the problems associated with sovereign debt. Italy's bond sale today will show if that contagion is starting across EU states. If it is we will be in the firing line soon enough!

GGG,

I will take a punt that even if Labour wins a working majority in this election there will be a challenge to Brown within a year and we will see a new 'unelected' PM. I think Darling will cement his position at the treasury and that means Milliband, Johnson or Balls will be the head honcho. I can't believe anyone would back Harriet! Milliband, looks like he/they have a chromosome missing, Johnson, can't lie straight in bed, Balls, take your wife for a long holiday, about 5 years! What really grates me is that we don't even elect MPs who make up the running team for the country as we are supposed to do. We are supposed to elect people who form a body out of which the cabinet is picked. Brown has stuffed his cabinet with unelected people. If he gave Mandy anymore titles they would run out of ink! Lord Mandelson: First Secretary of State, Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills and Lord President of the Council. I can understand the reasoning why a leading businessman, or woman, might be asked to be a special adviser, given their proven knowledge and skill, but not if they are 'given' a whole national department to run, that's not our democratic system and it shouldn't be our political system neither!

I do actually think this supposedly Keynesian reply to abrupt recession is workable but not in the manner Brown has applied it. I won't go into the reasons because accusations of hindsight being a wonderful thing will apply but it would have gone a long way into the labour market refocusing we will soon see.

[Monsta®]

should they not just get kick out of the eu so they dont drag every one else down?

[Malcolm Robinson]

Monsta,

We have to be careful here we are talking about EMU members not all EU ones, there is quite a difference. Yes basically to your question and that is what German and Dutch public opinion is saying. In fact that German opinion will show itself on the 9th (I think) of next month at the German elections. They could have legitimately kicked Greece out of the club citing falsification of figures when Greece entered EMU but it is way beyond that now there are too many reputations at stake! Also it doesn't help in considerations with Italy, Portugal, Spain or Ireland. There is a massive problem building and the failure of the Eurocrats to tackle this earlier have made the situation much worse. The Yanks have now come out and said Euro problems are a direct threat to their economic strategy. What you have to consider is the sovereign debt held by most western economies and the fact that they have used cheap credit to borrow up to and well passed the limit they were able to repay. If you factor in structural debt the picture is abysmal! They seem to be trying to use inflation to lessen the burden their debt piles are making for them going forward and like QE that is a mistake!

[Monsta®]

all the more reason to vote UKIP on 6th of may.

[Malcolm Robinson]

all the more reason to vote UKIP on 6th of may.

Oh yes Lord !*!@# whatsisname is real leadership material! They would have been better off sticking with Nigel at least he might have known what was in their manifesto!

Anyway don't tell me you are mellowing in your old age, what's happened to your fascist tendencies???

[Monsta®]

Oh yes Lord !*!@# whatsisname is real leadership material! They would have been better off sticking with Nigel at least he might have known what was in their manifesto!

Anyway don't tell me you are mellowing in your old age, what's happened to your fascist tendencies???

its lord pearson

separated at birth!

what you mean mellowing! its just the British nazi party have no chance so i would rather waste me vote on the u.k idiots party they will at least stop immigration and ban the burkah! oh and give the e.u the boot!

[Malcolm Robinson]

:lol: :lol:

Didn't have you down as a tactical voter..........

[threegee]

Didn't the Cameron undertaking that we will NEVER (that's quite a long time, even in politics) join the Euro get you?

Anyway I will be joining you at the European elections. We've got to pack Brussels out with people who insult the European President. It's the only way anyone will ever learn his name!

Malc: Do you honestly believe we will achieve 1.5 / 2.0 % growth this year, and 3 or 4% in each subsequent year? This is was the so called recovery is presaged on. No way under a Labour led govt, and Cameron is going to need a miracle even if he gets a majority.

The Arabs are standing in the wings to mop up any earnings surplus, and the Chinese are going to take their toll too. The real "elephant in the room" is unfunded public sector pensions; I've never heard this massive govt liability even mentioned during the election debates.

[Malcolm Robinson]

GGG,

There is no way the 'growth' figures are achievable, no way at all!!!!!! In fact they would take DIVINE intervention to achieve! If you go back through my postings you will see the people who play a major role in this, forecast we would be in a period of deflation at the moment and set interest rates accordingly. That is 100% wrong and we should be targeting the inflation problem we have as that erodes any advantage the £ devaluation gave exporters. Fiscal and monetary policy is WRONG and misaligned at the moment.

As to your last paragraph, I just read that one large oil refinery is upping production by a quarter to satisfy demand from China. This means higher petrol prices for us very soon! Also your elephant in the room comment. I said exactly that at a Lib Dem controlled NCC Area meeting about 3 months ago, as Merlin can testify, 'the structural debt carried by NCC is unsustainable and is the elephant in the room'. Imagine my surprise to hear the same thing now said by Vince, wonder if I can sue for plagiarism, and it is now part of current election parlance! You know how many years I have bleated on about this saying ratepayers are being made to pay for very generous public sector pensions and it cannot go on. Well now it can't! NCC are carrying half their TOTAL budget as pension deficits and the only reply I got to my questions, 'you will just have to keep paying in!'

[Malcolm Robinson]

As for the Euro question that is a bit more convoluted.

I think we should have already been in the Euro! The advantages by far outweigh the disadvantages even looking at the current mess the Euro is in. What we will see going forward now is the EMU members being forced into structural changes which will ultimately make the Euro even stronger as a world currency. Either that or it blows apart within a year! The UK is shying away from the real structural changes needed to re balance our economy from one built on indebtedness to one built on a sustainable fiscal policy.

I do accept that the only reason the UK are not being downgraded by the ratings agencies at present is that WE control our own monetary policy and can devalue or restart the printing presses. That isn't an option for the other EU countries with similar sovereign debt problems. However looking into a crystal ball it would seem reasonable to assume we will ultimately use either Euros or Dollars as national currency.

As I said on another posting I think the leader debates have turned the main party leaders into PR men equipped with the necessary scripted ad libs and sound bites and that is what Dave's 'never' quote is all about.

[Malcolm Robinson]

Well those Italian bonds went out pretty well, in fact being oversubscribed. It does seem strange that a country with an even worse record of debts than even Greece can attract a yield of just over 4% while the Greek bonds are just under 10%. Italian state borrowing is 115% of GDP!

Anyway it looks like the Eurocrats are now actually going to start a restructuring, thanks to the markets pushing them into it, and Greece at first glance looks to be 'saved'. However we have to look a bit closer and think about the leaks coming out about this deal. At first 40B Euros was being talked about, my estimate was 120-150B, and we now see talk about 120B over 3 years. I still think we will see the final figures topping that and more in line with my larger estimate! The whole point of this intervention is not to make Greece reliant on hand outs, it's to make her more streamlined and to get her trading in the black. This has always been IMF thinking. What they have come out with and said is that their aid will take 'junior' position and this is something of concern to us as we make up about 5% of IMF funding. Any possibility of a Greek default, and I think that is inevitable as she cannot service the loans she has now never mind these other mind boggling amounts talked about, means the 'investors will see a loss. So in effect the IMF may well have agreed to take a financial hit being the secondary investor behind the ECB. That is the wrong way around not only on a straight financial basis but without primary control in the hands of the IMF can the Eurocrats take the necessary decisions needed, what we have seen over the last few months would seem to suggest not! It is also of concern that the leaked new austerity measures being considered will probably push Greece into a depression which will take many more years to correct. That is not the way to go! With this crisis now openly affecting the international banking sector and in particular interbank lending anyone else see comparisons with a couple of years ago?

[Malcolm Robinson]

Getting back onto domestic politics for a minute I see none of the 3 Messiahs were willing to list what will really have to be done to get our economy back on track. If that last debate was all about the economy then I would have thought that was the time to spell out exactly what they intend to do if they win the election. Without providing the real and necessary information none of them can claim to have a popular mandate irrespective of what happens on the 6th!

On a different thread I suggested a question; tell us the real debt problem we face. This is important because until we know the size of the debt we cannot quantify the measures needed to reduce it. Here I am talking about including all off balance sheet stuff, the kind of stuff Blair and Brown have been so willing to push over the last few years, like PFI. These are real debts and if we don't consider them and take appropriate actions we will hit the buffers at some point and wake up with a national debt about 4 times the publicised size! The fact that they are not due is fine and yes roll them over but lay them on the table so we can have a plan in place to pay for them when they become due. If we don't expect another wave of QE!

Let's look at the furore about this 'tax on jobs' the National Insurance increase Labour want and the Tories want to scrap. Fiscally we are talking about £6B, a not inconsequential figure by itself but considered against the annual £163B we need to service our debts it really palls into insignificance!

I would like to paste in a quote off the FT which says it all really:

The modern career politician wants to BE something, not to DO something. To that end, they will say anything they have to say, and do anything they have to do to, and any problems they face in office are a bridge to be crossed when they come to it. A term in the hand is worth a dynasty in the bush.

A strange ally to this position seems to be Sir John Gieve, a Deputy Governor of the Bank of England and a member of the Monetary Policy Committee. His thoughts are that 'Everyone's saying they will do everything that is necessary but they are not spelling out how draconian some of these are going to feel on the ground.' Of course we then have to consider the rest of his utterances and we see him trying to maintain the illusion of independence for the BoE and the MPC whilst at the same time justify them working in joint partnership under the auspices of Government. They are either independent/autonomous or not, you can't quantify it!

[Malcolm Robinson]

I think it is worth looking at what these austery measures actually mean for the Greek people, and by Greek people I mean the vast bulk of her population. Yes there are too many public sector employees for the size of her economy and some of their employment rights are plain crazy but lets look at the average employee. Salary about 1200-1400 Euros a month on top. This is paid over 14 increments over a year and already the 2 'extra' payments have stopped and they are now paid over 12 with no increase in the monthly sums. This is a salary cut of about 15%. Salary freeze for the next 2 years at least. Union and even arbitrator negotiations abolished. Redundancy allowed to double in the private sector. (This is regulated at present and means only 2% of a workforce per month can legally be put on redundancy notice, I know?) Redundancy payments decimated. Under 30yr old unemployment benefit, 77 Euros a MONTH for up to 6 months, and they are looking to scrap this entirely. General unemployment benefits about 200 Euros a month for up to 12 months, means tested. OAP payment, yes they do retire early compared with Germany etc or even us, about 400 Euros a month and they are looking to shave that by 20%. To really put the knife in there is talk of a rise in VAT to something like 25% so immediately you make the cost of living shoot up yet cut the salaries of the people who are supposed to pay it. That is squeezing until there is no pip!

Does anyone wonder why there is so much discontent on the streets in Athens?

The tax measures in place already could go some way to explain why some commentators quote figures of around 30% for tax evasion and a thriving black market. These measures will only increase that and jeopardise Greece's return to a stable economy. It would also seem strange to hear Merkel say harsher austerity measures are needed, these seem pretty harsh to me already, but then she is maybe just playing to the gallery in the run up to her elections.

[Malcolm Robinson]

Anyone really into this topic might like to see the Stratfor immediate timetable for Greece:

May 3

•ECB/EU Commission Approval: The European Central Bank (ECB) and the EU Commission will have to approve the May 2 deal between Greece and IMF/EU negotiators. This is a key step before eurozone leaders can vote on it.

•The German Cabinet Weighs In: Germany's executive branch will likely agree to the deal this day. However, this is part of a process that is expected to take a week.

May 5

•Greek General Strike: Greek trade unions — which have more than 1 million members — are expected to hold a general strike. The one thing that can derail the bailout of Greece at its start is potential for social unrest. If Greek unions sustain strikes over a considerable time period, or if violence in the streets intensifies, the government could become unable to enact the agreed-upon austerity measures.

May 7

•Germany Decides: Germany is expected to seek parliamentary approval for the bailout deal by the end of the week of May 3, although the Bundestag final vote could take place on May 10. May 7 could bring the vote of the Bundesrat — the upper house — and a deal between the major parties. This is a key hurdle that needs to be cleared in the bailout process because Germany's decision will signal to the rest of the eurozone — particularly countries skeptical of the bailout, like the Netherlands and Austria — which way Berlin is leaning. The vote is expected to pass, with key German officials no longer referring to the financial aid package as a "bailout of Greece,” but rather a defense of the euro against speculators — a marked shift in tone likely to rally public support for "protecting the euro” as opposed to "bailing out the Greeks.”

May 10

•Eurozone Summit: Eurozone leaders will meet in Brussels to most likely officially approve the Greek bailout package, although they could also pre-approve it at a teleconference on May 2. The key at this point will be for the bailout to be large enough to "shock and awe” investors into feeling reassured about the eurozone's support for Greece.

•Germany's Final Decision: The final vote in the Bundestag, Germany's lower house, could take place on this day.

May 19

D-Day.. Greece will either make the payments on its debts or default as it can no longer borrow on the open market.

My thoughts are that the final final decision will be made in the Bundestag or on the streets of Athens!

[Malcolm Robinson]

Well details of the latest 'bailout' for Greece have emerged. Package is worth around 110B Euros and this will be split 80B from euro zone members and 30B from the IMF. Let us not forget this package has to be confirmed independently by each parliament in the euro zone and cannot be enacted until such time. The proposed 10% decrease in debt /GDP over 3 years looks optimistic to say the least and is based on Greece trading positively in 2012 and afterwards. VAT is to go from 21% to 23% and this after it was raised to 21% from 19% in March. Wage structures are playing a large part in the austerity plan with public sector wage cuts expected to drive down wages in the private sector? Lays off in the public sector have been curtailed to temporary workers as fulltime workers have special rights as part of their contract by law. This may be enough to water down any protests on the streets or maybe not if we look at the details of the allowances cut for all public sector workers. Lots more other details of this new austerity package emerging but we really have to consider the fact that to stand on her own feet Greece has to get into a position of being able to repay her debts and not need handouts to do that. She can only do this by trading profitably and this new plan looks to push her into recession not out of it. There is one part of the programme noticeable by its absence, default or haircuts on loans. Without an agreed default I think Greece will always be unable to repay its debts they are just too large now for the size of the country's economy. I would therefore consider the economic 'growth' figures used are pie in the sky!

[Malcolm Robinson]

Having had a chance to consider this new bail out further and being able to read more of the proposed measures it is starting to look to me that this whole effort is aimed towards propping up the EMU banking sector! Accepting that, then austery measures can be considered as a smokescreen and initially it looks to be working as more focus seems to be on them and not the minutiae of the deal. On the face of it Greece is being given new loans to pay off her existing debts, bit like our own QE programme, and the only saving rationale is that the 5% interest rate is lower than she can achieve on the open market. This is like getting an alcoholic off the drink by giving them crack cocaine! As there is no default or haircuts talked about we now have to wonder why, in whose interests is it for Greece not to default? As I mentioned in an earlier posting there has been a merry-go-round where primarily French and German banks, ours as well, have been buying Greek bonds (Yield 7%)then depositing them with the ECB as collateral (interest charged 1%) and making a tidy 6% profit. Doesn't take a master of international finance to work that one out does it! So Greece isn't being allowed to default and it is being given new loans to pay existing one as they come due. Even at the new 5% figure no doubt there will be plenty of takers for Greek bonds as long as another ratings agency doesn't downgrade them so that the ECB is not allowed to take them as collateral.

This ain't about saving a country and its people from the desperation of insolvency and bankruptcy; it's about keeping the banks at the playing tables of the 'no lose' Casino d'International with Trichet as croupier!

[Malcolm Robinson]

Looks like the latest EMU/ECB/IMF plan for Greece isn't as watertight as the Eurocrats hoped for. Trichet has now admitted he may have to tear up the EMU rule book to tackle the Greek problem and stop contagion and this is before the major players have had the chance to vote the proposed measures thorough their respective parliaments. Cyprus alone has taken the necessary steps. What we have seen is the austerity measures already in place are producing popular unrest but don't take what you see on the BBC as gospel it isn't actually as bad as portrayed according to the Greek bloggers I speak to. The left wing Greek politicos are trying to stir up the rest of the population but as yet the vast majority are worried but not ready to take up arms! Interesting picture I saw the other day of reserved policemen applauding the demonstrators while their on duty colleagues had to deal with the front lines. Strange, maybe not if we consider the 20% pay cut they are to take! If we consider the time lag now in effect while EMU domestic parliaments ratify (or maybe not) this plan then it is technically possible for Greece to become insolvent before the deal is rolled out. Not a good position to be in but one Trichet will have to face up to. With all of the focus on the headline figures for a possible bail out I keep coming back to the fact that for Greece to start and repay debt on her own would need a turnaround in her economy not just cut backs, she has to trade profitably and earn more than she needs to run and so be able to pay back debt. The austery measures will limit that ability to say the least so in effect is the plan is to make her reliant on hand outs? Even if she meets all the conditions laid down she will emerge with huge fiscal debt so what exactly is the point? When the Greek people start to realise this we may well see their Mediterranean temperament to the fore! There really has to be some sort of deal done with present debts and that means either default or haircuts! Maybe Trichet might be willing to discuss default on all the Greek paper the ECB holds but then it's the owners not the holders who are liable and who are they.......banks! It keeps coming around to protecting the banks every way you slice this particular cake! What may well scupper this or any deal is the likely effect rising inflation will have as parts of the deal have built in inflation rises for Greece.

There seems to be an explosion of wealthy Greeks buying London investment properties. As pointed out to Monsta earlier if you have a few bob and you are Greek what's the best way of protecting your dosh ahead of a devaluation, get it out of that currency and with the pound at almost parity.......

[Malcolm Robinson]

It would seem the geo-political differences within EMU members is the real issue at stake here. I totally endorse the idea that without political union, monetary union as a building block for a 'federalist' style EU was a forlorn hope irrespective of who backed the idea! Given the current uncertainty aboard within the 'club med' members it may make more sense to have two Euros running side by side, one for the northern members and one for the Mediterranean membership. There is precedence for this as the Euro rolled out alongside national currencies for its first year or so. It could be done and would enable the different labour markets and work ethics to be recognised which I consider to be the real European 'elephants in the room'.

As I have already stated it is my belief that these ECB measures are more to do with protecting bank interests but looking at their mechanisms even they seem flawed. Allowing Greek ,and others, banks to deposit their national bonds as collateral with the ECB to obtain loans at 1% while Greece has to pay upwards of 7% is plainly absurd if we are to believe the whole thing is about saving a country from going under! (That applies even at the proposed 5%!) Piling more debt onto an already precarious debt mountain is nuts! Greece will have to default at some point and that will leave Greek banks insolvent. Now for what happens then we must look at what has just happened in the rest of the world banking system and we see banks saved by politicians who were willing to put their own populaces at risk by throwing the kitchen sink at the problem. There has been no real restructuring of banking policies so the bankers have not only had their jobs saved by the rest of us going into recession but they are once again untouchable and making billions! Trichet's statements of only a few months ago and regularly repeated that there can be no relaxation of lending/collateral rules can now be seen for what they were if we look at his present statement.

The Governing Council of the European Central Bank (ECB) has decided to suspend the application of the minimum credit rating threshold in the collateral eligibility requirements for the purposes of the Eurosystem's credit operations in the case of marketable debt instruments issued or guaranteed by the Greek government. This suspension will be maintained until further notice.

The Greek government has approved an economic and financial adjustment programme, which has been negotiated with the European Commission, in liaison with the ECB, and the International Monetary Fund. The Governing Council has assessed the programme and considers it to be appropriate. This positive assessment and the strong commitment of the Greek government to fully implement the programme are the basis, also from a risk management perspective, for the suspension announced herewith.

The suspension applies to all outstanding and new marketable debt instruments issued or guaranteed by the Greek government.

These guys are making it up as they go along so can we really trust any of them to take charge of national if not international economies? I think there is a resounding two letter answer to that question!

[Malcolm Robinson]

It strikes me that the Greek tragedy we are seeing played out in the faraway Hellenistic lands could easily be a case of 'there but for the grace of god.....' Yes we have monetary control but that apart how long before the markets test our ability to magic up (QE) the funds necessary to keep our bonds in triple 'A' territory? Not too long I would guess and it's only the easy targets of Spain, Portugal etc which have prevented a consistent run on the pound and UK bonds (without BoE intervention) already. We really need to come up with a better solution than that on offer now and by that I mean UKLTD finance.

I would like to ask anyone reading this just who is providing a goodly part of this slush money to keep the merry-go-round running? The answer is depositors and tax payers, anyone with a few bob in a bank or anyone paying a tax. Savers, all over the world, are being treated with contempt and offered almost zero interest while we can see the major banks are well and truly back into mega profits and still almost refusing to open up domestic credit lines. The BoE maintain the illusionary status of operating independently for the greater good by keeping base rates at just above zero. Their excuse was that it stops deflation but we are seeing rising inflation and very soon probably union unrest as people need wage increases to keep up with financing their normal lives. The whole thing is unsustainable and a pack of cards.

We really need economic models which are contemporary as most which are used are so dated they don't even take into account the internet never mind globalisation. Who would have thought that the Canadian teacher's pension fund would own our local water company, it does and we struggle to fit the economics into historic financial models. It really is 'time for a change' and a good place to start would be in imposing a sound political structure to the whole 'game'. If we accept that nations consist of three basic units, political, economic and military and only work well when each is in harmony with the others, and for the public good, then what we see now is a political supervisory elite which have failed in their responsibility. The fact is that the political system legislates over and above the other two is testament to its accountability at any democratic level.

Financial panics, and for that also read economic recessions, are integral within any system of capitalism, in fact they probably do more good than harm fundamentally. However they do operate erratically and instead of the reckless and unsustainable punished we often see risk adverse institutions penalised. When this happens the economic crisis becomes a political one and society in general has to pick up the pieces caused in the first part by the more 'esoteric' investment practices of the few. We now need a political class which can regain the initiative and restore balance and until we get that we are at the beck and call of any economic wind which fills our sails.