http://www.zerohedge.com/news/truth-behind-junckers-lies-second-largest-greek-city-1250-companies-have-shuttered-2012
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 08/22/2012 12:53 -0400
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/citi-sees-greek-exit-soon-september
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 08/22/2012 15:36 -0400
and.......
http://www.athensnews.gr/portal/8/57776
http://www.athensnews.gr/portal/1/57822
The Truth Behind Juncker's Lies: In The Second Largest Greek City, 1250 Companies Have Shuttered In 2012
European viceroy of various neo-colonial territories Jean-Claude Juncker, best known for being a self-professed pathological liar, just concluded a press conference in which he did what he does best: lie. Here is a sampling of the soundbites along with our commentary:
- EU'S JUNCKER SAYS TRUTH IS GREECE SUFFERS CREDIBILITY CRISIS - coming from a
- EU'S JUNCKER SAYS BALL IS IN GREEK COURT; not for long: ball will soon be repoed to the ECB
And much more propaganda. Here is the truth. According to Greek Thema, in Thessaloniki, the second-largest city in Greece, so far in 2012, an unprecedented 1,250 companies have shut down.This means no jobs, no tax revenues, no money in circulation. A complete and total economic collapse.So let us explain: while Greece and Europe may engage in endless check kiting Ponzi schemes: such as the most recent one, whereby Greece promises to pay Germany by issuing bills, bought by its banks, which in turn are repoed to the ECB via the ELA, with the cash used by the country to pay Germany and the ECB, even as Germany's contingent liabilities get more massive by funding the ECB's capital, the reality is that unless someone does some work, and creates real wealth, real money, instead of merely shuffling electronic cash from Point A to Point B, while the only thing increasing are German contingent liabilities, aka systemic debt, absolutely nothing will change.pathological liar, this one is our favorite- EU'S JUNCKER SAYS CONVINCED GOVERNMENT WILL TAKE ALL MEASURES. "all measures" = "all gold"
- EU'S JUNCKER: FULLY CONFIDENT GOVERNMENT TO TAKE ALL EFFORTS "all efforts" = "all gold"
- EU'S JUNCKER SAYS GREECE MUST OPEN UP CLOSED PROFESSIONS. Chimneysweep? Bootblack? Telegraph Operator? Tax Collector? Prosecutor? Uncorrupted muppet?
- EU'S JUNCKER SAYS BALL IS IN GREEK COURT; IS LAST CHANCE.The ball will be repoed to the ECB shortly
- EU'S JUNCKER SAYS NOT SAYING THERE WON'T EVER BE A 3RD PROGRAM or 33rd program
- EU'S JUNCKER SAYS GREEK EURO EXIT WOULD BE RISK TO EURO AREA and Obama's reelection
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/citi-sees-greek-exit-soon-september
Citi Sees Greek Exit As Soon As September
- Citigroup
- Currency Peg
- European Central Bank
- Germany
- Greece
- Gross Domestic Product
- Ireland
- Italy
- Portugal
- Sovereign Debt
- Unemployment
- Unification
"Prolonged economic weakness will persist - especially in the peripheral countries - with further periods of intense financial market stress" is how Citi's Willem Buiter's economics team sees the future in Europe. While they continue to believe that the probability of a Greece exit from the Euro is around 90% in the next 12-18 months; but more critically it is increasingly likely in the next six months - conceivably as soon as September/October depending on the TROIKA report. There is a crucial series of meetings and events in coming weeks and while they believe that the ECB's conditional bond-buying (and ESM/EFSF) may help avoid a 'Lehman moment' around the GRExit, they believe that there will still be considerably capital flight out of periphery assets should it occur. The reason being simply that even if funding costs were reduced,the current mix of fiscal austerity and supply-side reform will not return any periphery country to a sustainable fiscal path in coming years.
Citigroup: Global Economic Outlook
We continue to expect that the EMU crisis will persist, with prolonged economic weakness — especially in periphery countries — and further periods of intense financial market stress:
Euro area GDP fell in Q2 and we expect that overall euro GDP will fall in both this year and 2013, with severe falls in most periphery countries. The Citi Economic Surprise Index (CESI) for the US recently has moved close to neutral, but for the euro area it remains firmly negative.
Nevertheless, the ECB's efforts probably will not resolve worries over the long-run fiscal sustainability of periphery EMU countries:
Even with the resultant relatively low funding costs, we doubt that the current mix of fiscal austerity and supply-side reform will return any periphery country to a sustainable fiscal path in coming years. Supplyside measures rarely have big short-term effects on growth (indeed, labour market reforms can produce negative short-term effects), especially if limitations in credit supply limit scope for companies and households to borrow in anticipation of the eventual payoff from reforms. Any such boost probably will be overwhelmed by the drag from fiscal austerity — plus a varying mix of poor external competitiveness weak banking systems, weak housing markets, high private debts. Hence, we expect that growth in periphery economies will undershoot official forecasts, leading to above-target and generally rising government debt/GDP ratios in coming years.And the likelihood of Greece exit is becoming clearer:...while the ECB’s decisions may help limit the economic and financial market spillovers of Grexit, the likelihood of Grexit itself is coming into even sharper focus, in our view. There appears to be a sizeable — and probablyunbridgeable gap between the Greek government’s ability to quickly cut the fiscal deficit and implement major supply-side reforms and privatisations, and the measures that creditor nations would require to extend further funding.We continue to put the probability that Greece will exit the euro area (ie “Grexit”) in the next 12-18 months at about 90% and, within that timeframe, we think it is increasingly likely that Grexit will occur in the next 6 months or so, conceivably even as early as September/October depending on the outcome of the September Troika report on Greece.but a range of factors will determine the timing:The precise timing of Grexit, if it happens, remains uncertain. It could even occur as soon as September/October, if the upcoming Troika report confirms that Greece’s programme is off-track and creditor nations are unwilling to provide Greece any funding extension or extra time. However, creditor nations may provide enough funding to delay Grexit to after the December review, for example to allow plans for common bank supervision to be finalised.
Though the mechanics of the event will be extremely ugly - with dramatic inflationary impacts for the Greeks:The exact mechanics of Grexit also are uncertain. We envisage an extended bank holiday and some form of capital controls and limits on deposit withdrawals in Greece (and perhaps some temporary restrictions in some other EMU countries as well). Prior examples highlight that currency redenomination need not be uniform: for example, when Argentina abandoned its currency peg to the US$ in 2002, the government decided to apply a 1-to-1 exchange rate for Bank loans and a 1.4-to-1 exchange rate to deposits.Moreover, when East Germany adopted the Deutsche Mark as legal tender on July 1, 1990, just ahead of German unification in October of the same year, the East German mark was converted at par for wages, prices, pensions and savings up to a limit of 4000 East Mark/person. Financial claims, including corporate and housing loans, and savings in excess of 4000 East Mark were converted at a ratio of 2:1 into the Deutsche Mark.We assume that a new Greek currency would fall by about 60%, pushing inflation markedly higher in 2013-16, but the scale of currency decline is highly uncertain.And GREexit will not be the cathartic event many hope for:We think the EMU end-game is likely to be a mix of EMU exit (Greece), a significant amount of sovereign debt and bank debt restructuring (Portugal and, eventually, perhaps Ireland, Italy and Spain), with only limited official fiscal burden sharing (via the ESM, EFSF and ECB losses) and ongoing liquidity support from the ESM and the ECB. We still expect that Portugal will get a second bailout (or a prolonged extension of the current programme), with no PSI initially but a high chance of PSI and OSI over the next three years or so.
Ireland may well also need some external assistancebeyond the end of the current programme, although — with the deficit likely to undershoot official forecasts and evidence that the country has some access to markets — this may take the form of partial funding via the EFSF/ESM and the backstop of ECB market purchases if needed.Nevertheless, for Portugal, Ireland, Italy and Spain, the crisis looks set to leave a legacy of high unemployment and very high government debt/GDP ratios (90%+, and, in most cases, well above that level). We doubt that any of these countries will be able to sustain normal market access at a tolerable yield without the backstop of official support in coming years.
and .......
http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_wsite1_1_22/08/2012_457836
Municipal offices in Attica to strike on August 29-30
“The price of municipalities’ inability to operate will be paid by the citizens of Attica, who will be deprived of services that are necessary to their quality of life,” the association said. On August 30 the national association of local authorities will be holding an assembly, during which more protest action is expected to be discussed. |
Over half of island businesses dodge taxes, says SDOE
SDOE reported that from July 6 to August 19, its officers inspected 4,067 businesses and found 55.7 percent to be in breach of taxation laws, writing up 2,266 establishments for a variety of violations, led by failure to issue receipts. In the same period last year, SDOE conducted 2,864 checks and found a slightly lower 53 percent of businesses to be dodging their taxes. The highest number of tax dodgers were discovered on the popular islands of Naxos (73.9 percent), Santorini (68.4 percent), Myconos (64.5 percent), and Paros and Antiparos (63.7 percent). |
Minister calls on intelligence service to help hunt down 'arsonists'
“There are indications, if not proof, that the fires on Chios are due to arson and we have therefore mobilized together with the fire service, the police and the National Intelligence Service,” Dendias said, referring to three fronts on the eastern Aegean island that burned into their fourth day, destroying thousands of hectares of farm and forest land. Dendias’s comments mirror statements made on Tuesday by a spokesman for the fire service, which, he said, is facing a “titanic task.” Nikos Tsongas said that there have been a total of 282 blazes in the last three days alone, with 86 breaking out on Tuesday. The number of fronts as well as the timing of the blazes, Tsongas said, suggest that they may be the product of orchestrated arson attacks. He specifically cited the case of Zakynthos, where four blazes started almost simultaneously at different points of the Ionian island. Tsongas said that the fire service has had to focus its effort on Chios, where four days of constant blazes have razed around 25-30 percent of the island’s precious mastic trees. Recording of the damage done to the island’s mastic and other crops began on Tuesday by a team of inspectors from the Agricultural Insurance Organization (OLGA), who said that it will take approximately 10 days to fully assess the magnitude of the destruction. The Chios Mastic Growers Association, however, said that it estimates the crop damages will come to around 4 million euros. Meanwhile, a blaze near Ancient Nemea in the northeastern Peloponnese on Tuesday closed the national highway from Corinth to Tripoli and traffic was diverted to byroads, as nine fire trucks and two water-dropping planes tried to quell the flames. A fire that began on Monday in Troizonia in the eastern Peloponnese also continued to burn on Tuesday, as did a blaze in Gytheio, also in the Peloponnese, which began on Sunday. |
| Kouvelis reiterates support for government | |||
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The leader of the Democratic Left, the smallest party in the government, has reiterated his party's support for the government, while admitting that he has not seen the final text of cost-cutting measures.
"We will do whatever is possible in order for the government's work to proceed, with society 'standing upright'," Fotis Kouvelis told a meeting of his party's parliamentary group on Wednesday.
"Our aim is that Greece will remain in the eurozone with the least possible cost," he said, adding that the Democratic Left is the guarantee that the austerity measures will bring the least possible repercussions to society.
Kouvelis informed his MPs that he has not received from the government's economic staff the text which contains the details of the new measures.
It is understood that one of the party's MPs, Odysseas Voudouris, has written to his fellow deputies expressing his reservations on whether the proposed measures are in line with the framework agreement between the three government parties.
No cuts in special salaries
Earlier, the party's spokesman, Andreas Papadopoulos, said that "government plans for early retirement … could replace the reserve labour measure".
Speaking on local radio, he noted that the government must proceed with public administration reform, including the shutting down or merger of state agencies and civil servants' evaluation, "in order to send a message to our European partners that something is moving in this country".
Papadopoulos said there will not be any cutbacks in special payrolls, especially for armed forces, in 2012.
He did not rule out that cuts in special payrolls will take place later.
"The finance ministry's only commitment is that cutbacks will not be applied in 2012."
The 195,000 civil servants who receive special salaries includes judges, doctors, military officers, university professors and Orthodox bishops.
Under the terms of the second memorandum, the government was obliged to cut special salaries by 12 percent from July 1. (ΑΜΝΑ, Athens News/dmcu)
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| News bites @ 5 | |||||
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1. JUNCKER VISIT Luxembourg's prime minister and Eurogroup head Jean-Claude Juncker will meet on Wednesday evening with Prime Minister Antonis Samaras as part of his brief visit to Athens. The premier is expected to present Juncker with the 13.5bn euro plan and try to gain the Eurogroup head’s support for the government’s fiscal adjustment efforts. The meeting will take place at 5.30pm at the Maximos Mansion and joint statements are expected at 7.30pm.
2. DIPLOMATIC IMPROPRIETY Syriza on Wednesday accused the government of having a hand in eurogroup chief Jean-Claude Juncker's refusal to meet with party leader Alexis Tsipras during the former's brief visit to Athens, and called the refusal a "diplomatic impropriety". Spokesman Panos Skourletis said on NET TV channel that "this decision is the result of pressure and interventions of various circles both on the part of the government and of Mr Poul Thomsen", the IMF chief representative in the troika.
3. AIR TO BREATHE Prime Minister Antonis Samaras on Wednesday made an appeal in Germany's Bild newspaper for more time for the country to meet its borrowing obligations. "All we want is a bit of 'air to breathe' to get the economy running and to increase state income. More time does not automatically mean more money," he said.
4. NO DECISIONS There will be no decisions at Friday's meeting between German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, Merkel said during a trip to Moldova on Wednesday. Merkel added she would wait first for the troika report on the country’s progress. The premier will meet with Merkel in Berlin on Friday.
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