Poor Portugal. The country’s bonds have borne the brunt of investor frustration over Greece’s failure to reach an accord with private bondholders on writing down the value of their debt. The yield on Portugal’s 10-year bond soared yesterday with investors...
Read more »Portugal Bears Brunt of Greek Contagion
Europe Back From the Precipice?
As EU leaders gather for a summit this afternoon in Brussels, people are asking if Europe is stepping back from the precipice and moving into a more chronic phase of the debt crisis. My response is not yet, but we...
Read more »Is Europe Listening to Italy’s Two Marios?
Euro zone finance ministers meet in Brussels today and it looks as though they’re certainly listening to one of Italy’s two Marios. European Central Bank President Mario Draghi suggested after the bank’s January meeting that it would be “highly welcome”...
Read more »Can an IMF Firewall Stem the Euro Crisis?
The IMF, which is asking for as much as $1 trillion in funding, may step in to provide the firewall that the euro-zone rescue fund, the European Financial Stability Facility, is struggling to create. But would that be enough to...
Read more »The Price of Rajoy’s Silence
Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy has avoided making public pronouncements about his plans to cut the country's deficit and for structural and labor reform, delegating all that to his ministers. This strategy of saying as little as possible appears to...
Read more »Is a Credit Crunch Imminent in the Euro Zone?
Markets will be digesting yesterday’s news from the European Central Bank, which offered a great deal of detail on its unprecedented three-year loans to banks and the outlook for the euro zone. ECB President Mario Draghi said that the record...
Read more »Romney Runs Against…Europe?
There’s no way the euro zone crisis was going to help Europe’s image in the rest of the world. But exactly how much reputational damage has occurred was highlighted in the victory speech given by Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney...
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Markus Schreiber/AP
New Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti with his German counterpart, Angela Merkel.
Italy’s Mood Is Pro-Europe, For Now
Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti told Germany’s Die Welt newspaper there will be protests against Germany and the European Central Bank in Italy unless its citizens can see concrete advantages to the spending cuts and reforms his government is implementing....
Read more »Hungary Shows Euro Zone Where Not to Go
So much for having a currency outside the euro. Hungary sold just three quarters of the one-year Treasury bills it planned to today and the average yield rose to 9.96 percent. That’s an increase of more than 200 basis points...
Read more »Is the Euro Crisis Over?
Okay, admittedly not many people think so. But, one might be forgiven for thinking that a corner has been turned with the significant falls in borrowing costs over the past few weeks. Today, Portugal’s auction of 105-day bills registered a...
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