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Showing posts with label Bailout. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bailout. Show all posts

Sunday, June 19, 2011

EU mulls crisis bailout for Greece

Greece to get more help to fix debtvar cnnWindowParams = window.location.toString().toQueryParams();if(typeof cnnWindowParams.video != "undefined") {if(cnnWindowParams.video) {cnnLoadStoryPlayer('world/2011/06/18/magnay.greece.financial.crisis.cnn', 'cnnCVP1', '640x384_start_art', playerOverRide, T1);}} else {$('cnnCVP2').onclick = function() {if ($$('.box-opened').length) {$$('.box-opened').each(function(val){Element.fireEvent(val, 'click');});}cnnLoadStoryPlayer('world/2011/06/18/magnay.greece.financial.crisis.cnn', 'cnnCVP1', '640x384_start_art', playerOverRide, T1);};$('cnnCVP2').onmouseover = function() {$('cnnCVP2').className = 'cnn_mtt1plybttn cnn_mtt1plybttnon';};$('cnnCVP2').onmouseout = function() {$('cnnCVP2').className = 'cnn_mtt1plybttn';};}Greece's finance minister took the job on FridayThe IMF presents its economic outlook for Europe SundayThe EU says Ireland and Portugal appear to be meeting short-term bailout conditionsTalks on second Greek bailout package follow three weeks of street protests in Athens

(CNN) -- Greece's freshly appointed finance minister Evangelos Venizelos is due to attend talks Sunday on a second economic bailout package for his debt-strapped country. He joins other European Union finance ministers in Luxembourg for a two-day meeting on Europe's economic outlook.

Venizelos, formerly Greece's defense minister, became finance minister on Friday, when Prime Minister George Papandreou reshuffled the cabinet after three weeks of anti-austerity street demonstrations in Athens. Venizelos also took over the post of deputy prime minister.

The Greek bailout tops the agenda of the meeting of the Eurogroup and Economic and Finance Ministers Council, which representatives of the International Monetary Fund will also attend, according to an EU news release.

The IMF is contributing to the bailouts of European Union member countries.

IMF staff members will present their assessment of Europe's economy. They and the finance ministers will examine existing bailouts for Ireland and Portugal as well as the economic progress in those countries.

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Ireland is poised to meet proposed austerity conditions for the second quarter, according to the EU, and has received second quarter disbursements. Portugal has met requirements for the first payments of its bailout package.

The harsh reforms designed to help reduce Greece's enormous budget deficit have so far led to tax hikes and public sector job losses alongside already record-high unemployment.

The crisis raises concerns for Europe's currency, the euro. A default on its debts by Greece, or another struggling nation such as Portugal or Ireland, could adversely affect the world economy.

There are fears that efforts to restructure Greece's debt could send shockwaves through Europe's banking sector and spark investor panic similar to that in the 2008 collapse of Lehman Brothers, the U.S. based global investment bank.

Venizelos addressed the Greek nation Friday, urging consensus in solving the crisis.

"Our priority is the viability and sustainability of the public debt," he said. "There is no disagreement on this issue."

Venizelos, a veteran politician, steered Greece's preparations for the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens. He replaces Giorgos Papaconstantinou, who will become the environment minister, a government spokesman said.

"With the new composition of the government we make a new start," Prime Minister Papandreou told Parliament. "We face the biggest threat that our country has known over the last decades."

He said he tapped Venizelos to spearhead the implementation of what he called an "especially painful" and "difficult program of big structural changes that will lead our country to a viable economy during the following years."

Papandreou faces opposition from his party over the austerity measures needed to secure an additional bailout package.

The IMF said Thursday that it would continue to back Greece provided that Greece carried out the economic policy reforms agreed upon by the government.

The Greek government's popularity has plunged recently, and anti-government protests turned violent Wednesday, as demonstrators threw gasoline bombs at the Ministry of Finance and police fired tear gas at protesters, police said.

On June 9, the Cabinet approved a tough five-year plan for 2011-15 and introduced a bill in Parliament to put austerity measures into effect.

The government has said that the passage of these additional measures is essential to Greece's securing the fifth portion of the first 110 billion euro ($158 billion) bailout package that Greece signed with the European Union and the International Monetary Fund to prevent the country from defaulting on its debts.

Treasury prices fell Friday as worries over Greece's debt crisis eased in light of a possible bailout and investors shifted into riskier assets, such as stocks.

Journalist Elinda Labropoulou and CNN's Ben Brumfield contributed to this report


CNN

Sunday, June 5, 2011

Portuguese vote in shadow of bailout (Reuters)

LISBON (Reuters) – The Portuguese went to the polls on Sunday to elect a government which will lead the nation through a period of deep austerity and recession after it received a 78-billion-euro bailout from the European Union and IMF.

The election will end a period of political and financial turmoil that started with the collapse of the Socialist government in March and led Lisbon to become the third country in the euro zone to seek a bailout after Greece and Ireland.

The Portuguese, who face unemployment at its highest level in three decades, are expected to reject caretaker Prime Minister Jose Socrates in the snap ballot and turn to opposition center-right Social Democrat Pedro Passos Coelho.

Polling stations opened at 8 a.m. (2 a.m. ET) on a warm sunny morning in central Lisbon, but there were no queues outside - just one or two people waiting here and there.

The latest opinion polls gave Passos Coelho around 37 percent support compared with 31 percent for Socrates, which will most likely mean that the Social Democrat will need to team up with the small rightist CDS party to form a majority in parliament.

Antonio Barroso, Europe analyst at Eurasia, said such a rightist coalition government was the most likely election outcome.

"This would be the most straightforward option if the Social Democrats and CDS can secure an absolute majority between them," Barroso said in a research note.

"Both parties are strongly committed to the implementation of the bailout conditions and would easily negotiate a common economic programme."

The CDS has about 12 percent backing in polls.

"PARTICULARLY DECISIVE"

The formation of such a center-right government would be welcomed by investors, who lost faith in the country in the past few months, dumping its bonds and sending borrowing rates to euro-era highs.

President Anibal Cavaco Silva addressed the nation late on Saturday, asking people to vote and calling the election "particularly decisive" because Portugal "is submerged in a deep economic and social crisis."

"The government that will emerge from this election will have the responsibility to honor the commitments taken (under the bailout plan), which are very demanding," he said, adding that aside from fulfilling the terms, the government will have to guarantee social justice and fight unemployment.

A center-right government would be able to quickly enact reforms and austerity measures included in the bailout, such as sweeping tax hikes and deep spending cuts, to ensure the country reduces its large debts.

But Portugal's economy is expected to contract two percent both this year and next, raising tough challenges for any incoming government as the disposable incomes of the Portuguese decline and austerity takes its toll.

So far there have been few strikes and protests against the austerity, unlike in Greece and in neighboring Spain, but as the country's recession deepens that could change, analysts say.

There could also be growing discontent as the incoming government will have to launch widespread privatizations in an effort to cut state costs under the terms of the bailout.

Socrates, who stayed on as caretaker prime minister since he resigned in March, was half way through his second term when his minority government collapsed, worn down by the sovereign debt crisis and the dire state of the economy.

Both Socrates and Passos Coelho blamed each other for the bailout in the election campaign but the Portuguese appear to mostly hold Socrates responsible for the poor economy.

(Reporting by Axel Bugge; Editing by Angus MacSwan)


Yahoo! News

Saturday, April 2, 2011

Senator Grills Fed in Letter on Libyan Bank Bailout

FoxNews.com

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A U.S. senator says he wants answers to why the Federal Reserve provided more than $26 billion in credit to an Arab intermediary for the Central Bank of Libya.

Sen. Bernie Sanders , D-Vt., sent a letter to the Federal Reserve that also demands to know why the Libyan-owned bank and two of its branches in New York were exempted from sanctions that the U.S. slapped on other Libyan businesses to isolate Col. Muammar Qaddafi.

"It is incomprehensible to me that while credit-worthy small businesses in Vermont and throughout the country could not receive affordable loans, the Federal Reserve was providing tens of billions of dollars in credit to a bank that is substantially owned by the Central Bank of Libya," Sanders said in a written statement.

A Federal Reserve spokeswoman told FoxNews.com that the central bank has received the letter and will respond. She declined to comment further.

In the letter to Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and others, Sanders asked why the central bank made at least 46 emergency, low-interest loans to the Arab Banking Corp., in which the Central Bank of Libya owns a 59 percent stake.

Sanders also asked Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner why the Treasury Department earlier this month let the Libya-controlled bank skirt the economic sanctions against Libya.

Sanders also questioned why the Bahrain-based Arab Banking Corp. is even allowed to operate branches inside the United States.

The Treasury Department responded to a FoxNews.com inquiry by saying that Libyan-owned banks that were incorporated outside of Libya were allowed to continue transactions. The Arab Banking Corp. isn't incorporated in Libya, but U.S. sanctions call for freezing Libya's financial interest in the bank.

The Fed transactions were made public earlier this year as a result of a Sanders provision in the financial regulatory law that forced the U.S. central bank to reveal which financial institutions it bailed out during the financial crisis from 2007 to 2010.

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