Is the end nigh for the Euro? [vol. 3]
Discussion
gruffalo said:
Please they can't kick the can further down the street can they
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-32561967
Lending more is just madness surely?
I rather fear they can and still may, despite all the obvious evidence that Greece has not recovered in any way in the last five years, shows absolutely no sign of recovery whatever, has adopted economic policies that cannot possibly address their Insolvency, and therefore Greece, will not recover at all. Our own election chaos with promises being counter promised and ridiculous and unaffordable programs being offered daily without the slightest concern for the consequences to the ecoomy demonstrates that modern politicians have become entirely sef serving. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-32561967
Lending more is just madness surely?
Get elected by promising whatever you need to promise to get elected. Milk and honey for all, with supposedly no loosers, with absolutely no intention of keeping the promises, has regrettably, become the mantra of modern politics, in the western world. Get on the Gravy Train personally and feather your own nest could be another. What the EU have demonstrated clearly is that when push comes to shove the failing states are likely to blink last. That has deeply serious consequences for the EU and may well encourage similar approaches from the other failing states. I can see this getting a lot worse before it gets better. In the end Greece will go bust and then the trouble will really start to build. Not looking remotely, retrievable, is it?
However, quite how the EU can justify its position economically I have no idea. Perhaps because they are competely unconcerned about anything other than themselves, given the printing presses they contol and the income every Politiiabn within the EU is getting from the EU. Since the EU just decided to raise the expenses for each EU MP to some £24, 000 PER MONTH and not to bother with having an proper audit on the EU accounts because it suits them personally what else should we expect?
gruffalo said:
Has anyone on here found out whether or not Greece made yesterday's payment?
Perhaps one of the most obvious effects of the power of the EU in this nonsense is the extent of the news blackout currently being operated purely by a word in the ear of the news pundits who jump accordingly because as ever money talks, most especially with reporters. Perhas it is significant that the ratings agencies are now suggesting that Greece can fail to repay their loans and not necessarily default. Once such pathetic nonsenses become acceptable in public finance then all real value on the statements therefrom, is lost. Madhouse economics but cleary that is where the EU is heading rapidly.The EU cannot actualy create the recovery of Greece. The EU have failed in their efforts over five years to rescue Greece. The EU do not want Greece to leave the EU. In order to keep this Insolvency going, despite those facts, I would suggest, perhaps, new financial devices are being sought by the EU to provide further opportunity for yet more subsidies to be paid to Greece without the EU having to admit that, that is what is actually happening.
The Greek government are refusing to bend to the demands of the EU and the EU solution is yet another fudge whereby yet more additional Billions of Euros can be thrown onto the scrap heap, without any admittance that this is actualy happenning. The EU are clearly intending to pretend that these further devices are not part of the original deal.
Whether that will actually be successful does remain to be seen. But the EU have demonstrated throughout this affair that the cost of this disgrace is of no consequence to the EU bureaucrats and politicians. Just examine the expenses fiddles and the latest ridiculous expenses packages given recently to every EU MP. And then consider for how long year after year, the accounts of the EU have never been fully Audited. I sincerely regret to say that this is where I fear this nonsense may now be heading.
Mermaid said:
The gang of thieves will say they "Greece'd" it for the greater good.
Indeed they will, Mermaid, indeed they will!I really am becoming seriously concerned with the barefaced dishonesty of these deliberate misrepresentation of the real facts by politicians hell bent on personal gain and aggrandisement. The real losers in this disgrace will be the Greek population who will face desperate times once the truth is outed which it will, inevitably be, in time. And the poor EU taxpayers in the solvent states who will end up footing the bill because Greece is in reality simply not capable of ever repaying these debts. Therefore this will never hapen. The extent of the crookery and the extent of the fraud being deliberately loaded onto these unsuspecting workers is utterly disgraceful.
Many years ago my father reminded his congregation that stealing the sheep off the land was a crime, punishable most severely. Whereas, he pointed out, it woud seem that stealing the land from under the sheep, by a slight of hand quite deliberately, in a clever self serving utterly dishonest way, appeared to qualify miscreants as leading members of the Aristocracy. No wonder he was known as the Red Dean!
This disgraceful business shoud not be continuing. But it is continuing and the longer this goes on the bigger the ultimate losses will inevitably be to the population of Greece and ultimately the population of the solvent EU member states. That does seem to be how modern politics is now run!
Edited by Steffan on Saturday 2nd May 21:20
wc98 said:
the situation has gone beyond farce now . surely the only people they are fooling now are themselves ? it looks to me like greece is heading for a total collapse .why on earth the three main parties in the uk along with the scottish nationalists are so pro eu is beyond me.
I regret to say greed and personal gain are the primary motivation. Politicians see the tens of millions received by the Kinnock family from milking the EU and the tens of millions milked by Tony Blair and Gordon Brown and Peter Mandelson whist in power, (who's another retired politician on the gravy train) as the best way to ensure personal gain which is their primary motivation. Politics has aways been a dirty game. Clever modern politicians are just as dirty today, but present themselves much more effectively. Spin doctors and so on shoud have no place in politics. In fact in many ways I think politicians are simpy spin doctors themselves nowadays. I cannot see any change as yet things are getting steadily worse.
Steffan said:
Politics has aways been a dirty game. Clever modern politicians are just as dirty today, but present themselves much more effectively. Spin doctors and so on shoud have no place in politics. In fact in many ways I think politicians are simpy spin doctors themselves nowadays. I cannot see any change as yet things are getting steadily worse.
No 1 policy - stay in power. The rest is negotiable fodder.Mermaid said:
Steffan said:
Politics has aways been a dirty game. Clever modern politicians are just as dirty today, but present themselves much more effectively. Spin doctors and so on shoud have no place in politics. In fact in many ways I think politicians are simpy spin doctors themselves nowadays. I cannot see any change as yet things are getting steadily worse.
No 1 policy - stay in power. The rest is negotiable fodder.Meanwhile back in the hotbed of economic failure aka Greece, Syriza are making very heavy work of trying to square the circle of actually maintaining economically disastrous polices whilst at the same time promising to anyone who is daft enough to listen that all will be well because they want it to be well as the article below draws to our attention.
see: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/03/100-d...
The difficulties that Syriza are currently experiencing is hardly surprising really given that the actual polices that Syrza are actually proposing and effecting in Greece are diametrically opposed to the policies that the EU wish to see introduced into Greece in order that some slight semblance of recovery and improvement within the Greek economy could just possibly be effected? I rather doubt that even Franz Mesmer could pull that deception off!
The EU are visibly seeking any method by which yet further monies can be thrown onto the cheery bonfire of unrecoverable Greek debt and keep this nonsense going a litte longer. I would suggest that, unless and until Greece decides to reverse these daft policies the insolvency of Greece must grow steadily and there can be no recovery in the Greek economy whatsoever. Five years of steadily worsening failures and yet more evidence of the refusal of the Greek government to face reality seem to me to make any realistic proposals of the slightest recovery fanciful at best. But that does seem to be the EU approach.
I wonder what brilliant latest "Solution" the EU will dream up to enable this ridiculous nonsense to continue? Greece is not going to recover and Greece simply does not have the economic strength to remain within the EU unless Greece can recover the economic balance need to remain within such a currency? Unpalatable as that may be it does now seem to me to be an incontrovertible fact in this matter. Any suggestions as to how the EU can square the circle whilst Greece continues to overspend and refuses outright to make the essential economic changes needed? Can the EU continue this nonsense? Not for much longer I think? Credibility deficit for the EU is steadily stretching.
Mermaid said:
Not sure I share the same sense of impending doom about Irish mortgages, managing my own is enough worry ! However it doesn't take an economic genius to see that Germany is getting very close to a situation where it HAS to have higher interest rates, but with QE still starting, and France/Greece still contracting it has to make a choice.
Throw the periphery to the wolves, or accept inflation at levels higher than comfortable to the average Teuton voter.
Duh! I wonder what they will do ?
tick tock...
Financial Times said:
Greece is so far off course on its $172bn bailout programme that it faces losing vital International Monetary Fund support unless European lenders write off significant amounts of its sovereign debt, the fund has warned Athens’ eurozone creditors.
The warning, delivered to eurozone finance ministers by Poul Thomsen, head of the IMF’s European department, raises the prospect that it may hold back its portion of a €7.2bn tranche of bailout aid that Greece is desperately attempting to secure to avoid bankruptcy.
Half of the €7.2bn, which is the subject of intense negotiations between Athens and its creditors in Brussels-based talks that resumed on Monday, is due to come from the IMF. Without the funds, Greece is expected to run out of cash this month.
The warning, delivered to eurozone finance ministers by Poul Thomsen, head of the IMF’s European department, raises the prospect that it may hold back its portion of a €7.2bn tranche of bailout aid that Greece is desperately attempting to secure to avoid bankruptcy.
Half of the €7.2bn, which is the subject of intense negotiations between Athens and its creditors in Brussels-based talks that resumed on Monday, is due to come from the IMF. Without the funds, Greece is expected to run out of cash this month.
Crusoe said:
tick tock...
Intersting the FT are running this story, because certainly on the BBC it's nowhere to be seen and/or very difficult to find. Only place I;d heard was on ZH.Financial Times said:
Greece is so far off course on its $172bn bailout programme that it faces losing vital International Monetary Fund support...
Incidentally, apropos of both the Irish economy, staying in power and also rewarding failure(s), did we do this book yet?
The Untouchables: http://www.thebookpeople.co.uk/webapp/wcs/stores/s...
Certainly sums up Taleb's "anti-fragile" people well. Have just started reading a copy given to me by Digga snr.
Digga said:
Crusoe said:
tick tock...
Intersting the FT are running this story, because certainly on the BBC it's nowhere to be seen and/or very difficult to find. Only place I;d heard was on ZH.Financial Times said:
Greece is so far off course on its $172bn bailout programme that it faces losing vital International Monetary Fund support...
Incidentally, apropos of both the Irish economy, staying in power and also rewarding failure(s), did we do this book yet?
The Untouchables: http://www.thebookpeople.co.uk/webapp/wcs/stores/s...
Certainly sums up Taleb's "anti-fragile" people well. Have just started reading a copy given to me by Digga snr.
That article from the FT really does sum up the reality of the current hopelessness of the Greek position being utterly insolvent with no prospect at all of a realistic chance of the slightest recovery. Really now a simpe question of whether the unity and possible downside risk of the Domino effect on the other failing states is worth more to the EU throwing still mre billions at this steadily worsening problem?
There are ways in which this debt coud be written down without apparent further subsidy. Germany could suddenly accept the Greek claim for war reparitions and virtually wipe off the Greek debt? Very little time left with the loan repayments being imminent. What do PHers think might be the decision of the EU?
My own opinion is that the EU will try to avoid the crash but as the IMF is suggesting not possible without massive further write downs of the Greek debts. Which is of course what the EU promised would never be required when the last massive write downs of Greek debts occurred within the first "Solution" to this problem by the EU. Whatever the EU do now, I think there is a massive credibility gap opening and exposing the reality of the ineffectuality and incompetence of the EU to many observers. Not looking at all good for the EU and the Euro dream.
Steffan said:
Not looking at all good for the EU and the Euro dream.
Had a meeting with a French couple who are looking to import equipment manufactured by two firms I part own. They were actually very entrepreneurial and have a good business and a decent plan for our products, but very despondent about the French economic outlook - the handouts and the non-working culture, both of which they see as poisonous but politically sacrosanct.Digga said:
Steffan said:
Not looking at all good for the EU and the Euro dream.
Had a meeting with a French couple who are looking to import equipment manufactured by two firms I part own. They were actually very entrepreneurial and have a good business and a decent plan for our products, but very despondent about the French economic outlook - the handouts and the non-working culture, both of which they see as poisonous but politically sacrosanct.Even worse amongst Socialist politicians is the ready acceptances of excessive and unaffordable borrowings by the state to fund dreamworld projects dreamt up by those politicians who know from the start that this will result in the insolvency of the country but are happy to carry on, because they can make a financial killing out of this. The texttbook example being the disgraceful overborrowing that went on under the New Labour, Blair and Brown governments in the UK who have never admitted responsibilty for this fraud and will never admit responsibility for this fraud. Miliband is simply being equally utterly disingenuous in his ridiculous caims as to what can be afforded and deliberately misleading by inflating the level of taxation that the Socilalist claim to be able to extract from the taxpayers.
The supposed anti avoidance legislation, if it were ever enacted, which I doubt, will be hopllessly ineffective in seeking to stem the Billions being lost to the UK exchequer from tax avoidance, because the wealthy individuals who are taking this avoidance can afford vastly more in defending their rights than the UK government can afford to spend in seeking to prevent such clever devices. Far better for the UK to attract big earners into the UK and take a lesser share of their income as taxation, because in that way the spin offs from the Billionaires and Oligarchs congregating to the UK are enormous.
But Ed Balls and Miiliband are so stupid and shortsighted that they cannot see that. Better for them they think, to promise the world to the electorate and follow in the footsteps of Blair and Brown, mislead the electorate, rip off the country , ruin the economy and make personal fortunes in the process as did Blair and Brown.
After that slight rant I will return to the subject of the thread, feeling better for writing this.
The EU are desperate to prevent the collapse of Greece but have collectively failed to either reccgnise or manage the reality of the financial situation in Greece which has been visibly and rapidly declining year on year over the last five years. As a result it is completely unrealistic to try to continue to pretend any longer that Greece can recover, as the EU have been blythly doing for five very expensive years. The crunch is coming.
Just a couple articles below indicating that all is not at all well in this mess see:
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/72b8d2ae-f275-11e4-...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-32586764
Despite the obvious news blackout generally on this currently at least some reality is breaking through!
Acknowledgements to Digga and others for the FT tips.
The EU are staring into a real mess with this "Solution" which has proved to be anything but a real solution. There may be a little more time bought by the EU by yet more Billions of Euros being printed and thrown away to buy a little more, damned expensive time. But in reality Greece is beyond being bailed out. Tragedy for the population of Greece!
So now the Greek government introduces a tax on withdrawing money from your account: http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/world/europe/ar... (paywall)
Definitely no desperation to see here ... move along please ...
Definitely no desperation to see here ... move along please ...
All a little late given that 28bn euros has already been withdrawn.
750m due on the 14th of May, given that the Greek Government first forced all state hospitals and schools to bank in one place, and have now raided all the accounts to pay the last bill, for about a third of that, I am really wondering if they have the reddies on hand for the next bill.
Dragging isn't it
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