pensions have also been paid today, and people are understandably keen to get their hands on the money:
They can thank their great great great great great great great great great grand kids for funding the current pension pot. That's how far down the road the can has ben kicked thus far
I think in the end most all are looking at this and saying hey enough is enough now. Turkey was the next madness the euro trash had in store for us. I think Europe is a failed federal experiment as nobody had the bottle to create an actual leader to make real decisions and a lot of anger has been stored up on Greece.
please log in to view this image Greece news live: Troika begin work in Athens as investigation calls against Varoufakis grow Creditors need to thrash out conditions for an €86bn bail-out package after former finance minister is forced to defend himself against "hacking" charg
Greece was like giving some Billy Bob on benefits a set of credit cards, and then wondering why they'd maxxed them out without a thought for how they'd pay the bills. Retire at 45, yeah sounds good. 25% of population claiming to be goat herders and paying **** all into the pot, yep sound as a pound. What shall we build next Stavros? Pass me the plastic
all true. but in reality france and italy are getting there too. th german banks are minded and looked after while a 21 year old greek is made destitute. 5-10 years time thi will only be worse
Greek bailout deal agreed 'in principle' please log in to view this image The agreement came after all-night talks at a central Athens hotel Greece has agreed a bailout deal "in principle" with its creditors, the European Commission has said. The Commission said a technical agreement had been reached with Greece, which now requires political approval. Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has asked parliament to convene so that MPs can debate the details on Wednesday before a vote on Thursday. A deal on a new €85bn (£60bn) three-year agreement is needed to keep Greece in the eurozone and avert bankruptcy. Earlier, Greece's Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos had said "two or three small issues," were yet to be resolved with lenders, following overnight talks in Athens. The country needs a deal by 20 August, when it has a debt repayment of about €3bn to make to the European Central Bank. Technical deal A European Commission spokeswoman said a technical deal had been reached last night between parties including Greece, the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank, and the European Stability Mechanism. She said a series of phone calls between political leaders would now take place. A Greek official said earlier that Greece agreed the function of a new independent privatisation fund, and how non-performing bank loans will be administered. "Finally, we have white smoke," the official said. Deregulation of the natural gas market, another sticking point, was also agreed. But Finnish Finance Minister Alexander Stubb sounded a cautious note, saying more work needed to be done with the details to finalise the agreement. The Eurogroup of eurozone finance ministers is to meet on Friday to discuss approval of the deal, Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said. His centre-right People's Party, which has a majority in the Spanish parliament, will be asking other parties to vote in favour of the agreement, he added. please log in to view this image Greek bailout deal - some key points A Greek official said: The deal secures funding of around €85bn to service debt as well as to settle public payment delays and arrears over the next three years There will be a deal on primary surplus targets: 0.25% GDP deficit for 2015, 0.5% surplus in 2016, 1.75% in 2017 and 3.5% in 2018 The agreement reduces fiscal surpluses for the next 3 years by 11% of GDP - "As a result there will be no new austerity measures in the forthcoming period," the official said Recapitalisation of the banking sector will be completed before the end of 2015, with €10bn being immediately available The government did not consent to the sale of non-performing loans to private companies The agreement provides for a €35bn development package, known as the "Juncker package" According to Greek reports, which EU officials did not confirm, the deal phases out early retirement and brings in a gradual increase of the pension age to 67 by 2022. There will be a review of the Greek social welfare system with the aim of cutting expenditure, and the gas market will be deregulated by 2018. Privatisation plans for ports at Piraeus and Thessaloniki will go ahead, there will be an opening up of professions, and a tightening of the definition of who is a farmer. In addition, the reports said there would be an increase in the tax on shipping. Meanwhile, Mr Tsipras said he wanted a draft law on the bailout submitted to parliament later on Tuesday, so that MPs can debate the issues on Wednesday and vote on Thursday. He said in a letter to MPs: "The crucial nature of the situation requires the immediate convening of parliament to proceed with the deal's approval and allow the disbursement of the first instalment [of money]." please log in to view this image please log in to view this image Analysis: Robert Peston, BBC economics editor The really hard negotiations start soon - on how to reduce Greece's massive debts, set to peak at close to 200% of GDP or national income in the next two years (according to the IMF) to an affordable level. Without debt write-offs, prosperity will never return to Greece, and its future in the euro will never be assured. With debt write-offs, populist parties throughout the eurozone will be able to claim to voters that they have nothing to fear and everything to gain from throwing out the mainstream establishment parties and re-asserting national sovereign rights to economic self-determination. Or to put it another way, euro politics and euro economics of Greek debt forgiveness point in diametrically opposed directions. Which is why no-one should see today's important bailout agreement for Greece as a permanent happy ending. How did Greece get here? 25 January: Syriza wins the general election on an anti-austerity platform 21 February: Eurozone finance ministers extend Greece's financial rescue programme by four months, just days before the previous programme ends 27 July: PM Alexis Tsipras calls a referendum for voters to decide whether to accept a new bailout deal offered by international creditors 28 July: ECB freezes liquidity lifeline 29 June: Greek banks close after government introduces capital controls, with individuals only allowed to withdraw €60 a day 30 June: Eurozone bailout expires, Greece misses €1.6bn payment to IMF 5 July: Greeks vote against a new bailout offer in referendum 13 July: Eurozone leaders agree to offer Greece a third bailout conditional on Greece's parliament passing tough reforms 16 July: Eurozone ministers agree a €7bn (£5bn) bridging loan for Greece 20 July: Banks reopen after three weeks but restrictions on transfers and withdrawals remain 11 August: Greece says third bailout deal broadly secured http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-33858660
Ah so they are on the hook for even bigger debts having sold off all the assets and there is no Deal to write off a red cent of debt....
Sooner or later, the likes of George Soros will play roulette with the £, so it will drop. As soon as I have sold my house here in the UK and bought my property in Spain, then it can. In all seriousness we should have joined from the start however Tony Blair was too scared of the Tory ruled press to take the plunge so the sooner we join the euro the better. Besides if it wasn't for EU membership the working class in this country would have fewer rights than at present - would there be minimum wage, paternity leave, max hours for doctors and commercial drivers. I doubt it!! What the UK needs is a PM who loves the EU but is prepared to reform its bureaucratic institutions. Someone like the best PM this country has ever had in my lifetime - Harold Wilson!!
A big problem is interest rates, the financial institutions are getting money at near or at 0%. You have the money stealing destructive quantitative easing too, printing money from thin air, which is essentially the same as taking money out of your pocket right while you just look on and take it. An interest rise of any note will start off significant infaltion. Think things are expensive now, just wait. Plus they have created another growing property bubble to boot. UK with 2,5 times the debt greece has. 90% of GDP like and it growing and gowing, there is literally no way out of the debt. Especially when all the assets that could turn a profit were run into the ground, slashed and then privatised. NHS to follow, over 4000 nurses given the boot since 2010. Front line local services already taken over by private firms, quietly. Osborne is a slimy robbing batard, lining his own pockets and those of his ilk. Cameron and his banker\bonds market family history. You know who's side they are on Look at the whole bailout thing.. banks got fat made billions and took mental risks, and they just took our money to pay for it and continue to live the highlife What do we do.. take it and bend over for more. Wasting your time voting
Prison services, education, social services, employment services, medical, ports, railway, energy, Oil &Gas. These government cretins milked the **** out of the assets and services while they ran them and run them into the ground pissing away vast fortunes of money borrowed with your great great great grandkids as collateral, and then cut the **** out of them and privatised.
Under TTIP there can be no re-nationalisation of former state assets. Austerity is driving this push, Greece was ****ed either way, bailout or no bailout, they chose to suffer slightly less in the long term instead of slightly more suffering over a shorter spell. All that money is not going to greece, Ronaldo buying a Greek island for his agent as a wedding gift, there is your EU membership. Flogging chunks of your country. Ports Islands and got knows what else, all at knocked down prices. Yes the greeks ****ed themselves up it's the manner of how the EU is forcing them to deal with it that is so destructive. Without the assets they are being forced to flog the greek government can only really gain $ by taxing the **** out of everything. Half their GDP is tax already! All to save the EU banks that hold Greek Bonds, mainly Deutche Bank. A crash in Greek bonds would put several EU banks under the 6% asset coverage for exposure on derivatives. It would start an asset sell off cycle that would lower the % of coverage for exposure as you own less assets when you flog some off. It ends up with a bank having no assets and huge exposure on gambles. Deutche Bank has several trillion worth of derivatives. Biggest in the world. Greece was "bailed out" twice to save that bank. A Deutche Bank crash would make the German economy **** the bed, they feared this when Ireland had to be put to the sword, Italy and Spain next. That's how close total EU bank meltdown in fact is. Most of the bailout Greece gets, goes to banks that hold Greek Bonds.
its the opposite... inflation driven by market forces will drive interest rate hikes to curb the inflation. right now there is zero inflation.. or very little... thus there is no real growth or demand in european economies and so interest rates are at the absolutle bottom. the ECB drove them down to avoid making any other call outside their narrow remit of keep inflation at 2% and use interest rates to do so. The moment quantitative easing started.. as you say printing money 20% of the value of the euro was wiped off. Thus making imports more expensive and export cheaper... the result is a lower cost base relative to others but the reality is the US did this 6/7 years ago and reduced theirs so the EU are only equalizing.... and britan sitting apart gets a flood of cheaper european products.
absolutely... and its only 200 bil... they are squeezing greece not as it will cause the crash but once it goes spain and italy are too big into these banks to be saved or pucshed round the same way. the focus on greece is to squeeze the life out of the little guy as a break water.
I can say with a 99% certainly that this process of bailouts is to save the major EU banks, they knew in 2008 that the problem can only be stalled by bailouts and that the huge risk and disparity between exposure and coverage would take a long time to address, it's far bigger than we are being told by the media of course. Like any pyramid scheme it only works if you keep feeding in new meat. Ireland Greece Spain Italy. Lets not forget Ukraine although not in the EU is getting loans. I wonder how many EU banks hold Ukrainian bonds? IF Greece defaulted it would have been a disaster. Did you see how angry the EU got. FFS the IMF had taken Greek Journalists to the US to train them up on promoting fear and disaster if Greece defaulted. To keep the banks who are bloated with risk and measly assets, the only way to stave off collapse is to retain the worth of bonds in Ireland Greece Spain and Italy, and that can only be achieved by lending the money, the same banks that own bonds are lending the money, even the ECB owns bonds in these countries. With such low coverage of exposure at just 6% (it was 8% but because none of the banks almmost could reach that limit they lowered it to 6%. To put this simply, banks could not cover 8% of their risks!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! EIGHT ****ING PERCENT! This puts the whole bonds market into context. So save the banks you need to save the risks they took by giving said broke countries money so they don't default on their bonds and debts. If Greece needs another bailout in 4 years they will get it guaranteed. The banking system cannot afford Greece to default it just cannot. It could not afford an Ireland default either. Receiving bailouts keeps you in the system instead of taking the hit and moving on, it's perpetual, bailout after bailout while being force to sell the very means that can make you a buck for decades to come
EU members dealing with Greece only fall short of economic stragulation, just short. When the the new Prime minister came in he had promised every thing he knew he cannot deliver.Members were just watching and laughing. Alexis Tsipras had to safe his face by getting humilated by member countries. No more Mr. nice guy !.
I honestly think the greeks were the least of thier worries and a break water.. I honestly think spain is the big issue. and italy. italians caved and put bankers in charge immediately.
Energy oil and gas I can go with but am confused as to how "These government cretins milked the **** out of the assets and services" such as education, social and employment services or even the railways. Will confess I am not the biggest economist so please keep any answers simple.
