That is essentially my view of the situation fir all the defaulters currently. I can see no permanence in this madness whatsoever.

How can Ireland continue to spend 52 billion a year with a tax revenue of 34 billion a year? By borrowing the difference from the markets. That's a deficit of nearly 20 billion and more than the entire health budget. That is a defecit of nearly 40% PER ANNUM. This is the economics of the madhouse.

I really do think this is totally irresponsible and disgraceful behaviour by the Irish parliament. They are selling their country down the river and there will be all hell to pay when the wheel comes off in the Irish economy. Which it must.

The same is largely true for all the other defaulters in the EU although I do think some are at last making a degree of effort to change. But the reality is too little and too late to actually affect the outcome.

The Spanish bond problem is upon the EU once again, despite another 100 billion subsidy agreed two weeks ago by the EU and I suspect the markets will be reacting badly in consequence tomorrow morning.

Reading the post from Irish, which clearly has, the ring of truth, I just thought,

"No. Enough is enough. This cannot continue. This is playing Mickey Mouse economics with the lives of millions of people. This is utterly irresponsible government and I fear for the consequences."

Hence my post.

I just cannot see how any of this can be reconciled in a free democracy. When the unsustainability of the defecit is as obvious as this, it cannot go unnoticed.

Latest from the beeb confirms that the markets are very unhappy about the EU approach to this systemic problem of the defaulters simply oit being a credible sustainable approach see: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-18950896

I thought the comment by Irish yesterday caught the current feeling of the whole approach by the EU to this problem being visibly unrealistic. It is not as if the defaulters are actually making any progress towards recovery.

The real sting in the tail, is that locked into the Euro. none of these sovereign states can actually address their insolvency. In consequence the while edifice can only continue whilst the EU pours in subsidy which in itself cannot address the underlying economic failures.

I can only see one end in this because the position if the defaulting states becomes more and more insolvent, as the EU lends, (well that's what the EU say it is: I think its a gift), more and more to inherently unsustainable economies.

I anticipate another panic and another new creative approach to not admitting the truth by the EU, very shortly. But I cannot see that the position is sustainable.

Trading in UniCredit and Intesa suspended.

Making a prediction and being proved right equals hindsight? Hpw does that work?

I wouldn't worry about Driller and his childish insults, they're the result of being perpetually wrong because you refuse to understand the subject. He's just bitter because the euro hasn't worked out the way he hoped.

Oh and while we are at it, Spanish 10yr yields now over 7.5% and another nine regions join the queue to be bailed out by the Govt who of course don't have any money. Things are so bad they've even officially scrapped the siesta! How long until the crowing peacock Rajoy is forced to request a full scalle bail-out?

Yep, been watching that. Fear of a knock on throughout the spanish regions as well, regarding internal borrowing.

7.5+ is unsustainable. There could be trouble ahead.

But while there's moonlight and music and love and an economic crisis, let's face the music and default?

I thought that's how forums worked; somebody makes an idiotic comment and other people point out its failings. Perhaps we should call this a "sticking your oar in board" rather than a forum?

I've been on this thread from day one, so I'm hardly butting in, although it's instructive to note you're another PHer who uses bafflingly inappropriate smileys at the end of each little dig

Question for the economic historians amongst you

There's a pattern to the timing of economic crises:

Wall Street Crash - Late October 1929

Black Monday - October 19 1987

Lehman Brothers - September 2008

US & European Bank Rescue Plans - October 2008


I've been surprised that the Euro fiasco has been kept afloat for this long, but as nothing structural has changed and as Germany appears reluctant to help meaningfully, and as the socio-economic realities bite in Spain / Greece / Italy, we're possibly in the final phase before the main trigger event

In the UK property world, August is a dead month when all the movers and shakers head off to Tuscany to quaff chianti, and deals are done when they're in September / October

Will the main players in the banking / hedge fund world also enjoy their August breaks and return with a fresh view of the world and decide that enough is enough, and the fun and games really kick off in September/October?

It seems they are holding their breath, and holding it together. Only needs one to give up..

Who exactly will bail out Spain, how and with what?

The words "too big to fail, too big to save" are the ones I'm thinking off.