Lloyds TSB and Halifax customers unable to access cash
Lloyds spokeswoman acknowledges a 'systems error' but cannot say how many customers are affected or when it will be resolved
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LLoyds says it is 'experiencing some intermittent problems at present and are working to resolve this as quickly as possible'. Photograph: Luke Macgregor/Reuters
Millions of bank customers are unable to access their cash following IT troubles at two separate banking groups.
Lloyds TSB, Halifax, Co-operative and Smile customers have reported being unable to access their accounts, withdraw money or make purchases in stores.
The latest glitch comes hot on the heels of a high profile IT issue at Royal Bank of Scotland in June which left millions of NatWest, Ulster Bank and RBS accountholders without cash.
The Co-op and Smile have 6.5 million banking customers, of whom 1.5 million hold current accounts. Many transferred to the banking groups following disruption to services at RBS and NatWest.
Lloyds TSB customers have taken to Twitter to complain about the service disruption. @SaladUK wrote: "My card was declined just now, it said 'Card declined' on the ATM but my internet banking is working. What's going on?."
@OliviaCreaven complained: "#LloydsTSB this is disgusting! No access to any money just before the weekend!!!! Sort it out."
Co-op customer Jane Morley (@jm3twink) tweeted: "Just had a panic as couldn't draw cash out but phoned bank & all Smile systems are down."
A Lloyds TSB spokeswoman acknowledged there was an issue but could not say how many customers were affected, what the cause was or how long it would take to resolve.
The Lloyds TSB Twitter account has tweeted: "We're experiencing some intermittent problems at present & are working to resolve this as quickly as possible", later adding: "We're sorry that customers are experiencing problems with some of our services, we're looking into this & will update you as soon as we can."
Halifax issued a statement saying: "We're sorry that customers are experiencing problems with some of our services, we're looking into this & will update you as soon as we can."
Customers of RBS and NatWest had their ordinary banking services back up and running within days, but the chaos affected Ulster Bank customers for a month.
and......
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2012/10/greek-citizens-storm-defense-ministry.html
Friday, October 05, 2012 4:58 PM
Greek Prime Minister Warns of Societal Collapse Like Weimar Germany; Citizens Storm Defense Ministry; Merkel Takes Gamble on Visiting Greece
Greece is politically and economically bankrupt. Unemployment is 24.4% and destined to get much worse with the latest round of austerity measures.
Worse yet, Greece is still encumbered by massive layers of bureaucracy that makes it difficult to get anything done.
Yesterday, in a massive breach of security, Greek citizens stormed the defense ministry. This has German chancellor Angela Merkel willing to take a chance on a trip to Greece next week.
Today, Antonis Samaras, the Greek Prime Minister warns of societal disintegration without urgent financial aid.
Worse yet, Greece is still encumbered by massive layers of bureaucracy that makes it difficult to get anything done.
Yesterday, in a massive breach of security, Greek citizens stormed the defense ministry. This has German chancellor Angela Merkel willing to take a chance on a trip to Greece next week.
Today, Antonis Samaras, the Greek Prime Minister warns of societal disintegration without urgent financial aid.
Antonis Samaras says Greece's democracy is in danger, comparing situation to Germany's pre-war Weimar Republic
Greece is teetering on the edge of collapse with its society at risk of disintegrating unless the country's near-empty public coffers are shored up with urgent financial aid, the country's prime minister has warned.
Almost three years after the eruption of Europe's debt drama in Athens, the economic crisis engulfing the nation has become so severe that democracy itself is now imperiled, Antonis Samaras said.
Resorting to highly unusual language for a man who weighs his words carefully, the 61-year-old politician evoked the rise of the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party to highlight the threat that Greece faces, explaining that society "is threatened by growing unemployment, as happened to Germany at the end of the Weimar Republic".
Mounting anti-austerity rage before a new round of sweeping EU-IMF-mandated austerity measures appears to have caught the government off-guard, with officials voicing fears over the ability of Samaras's fragile coalition to survive.
The unprecedented storming of Greece's defence ministry by hundreds of protesting dockworkers on Thursday – a breach of security not seen in modern times – has especially unnerved officials. On Friday, Samaras lashed out at "those who don't understand the meaning of law and order".
"The government is waging a battle on all fronts for the nation's credibility and its future so that the sacrifices made by Greeks aren't lost," he said, referring to the spending cuts and tax increases that have sparked record levels of poverty and unemployment. "I will not allow the country to become a free-for-all."The warning by Samaras coupled with the storming of the defense ministry is not a sign of a pending societal collapse, but rather a sign the collapse is well underway.
In the interview Samaras emphasised that Greek cash reserves would run dry by the end of November. "The key is liquidity," said the leader. "That is why the next credit tranche is so important for us."
The high-wire act of placating international lenders while keeping social unrest at bay will be tested as never before when Merkel, the German chancellor, flies into Athens next Tuesday. With anti-EU sentiment at an all-time high, opposition parties and trade unions vowed a baptism of fire.
"She should expect demonstrations. Greek society will welcome her with mass protests," said Panos Skourletis, a spokesman for the radical left main opposition Syriza party.
The Independent Greeks party, also vehemently anti-bailout, has said it will make war reparations a major part of its own protest when it stages a "symbolic blockade" outside the German embassy in Athens during Merkel's visit.
There is no reason to believe a visit from chancellor Merkel will stem the tide.
Mike "Mish" Shedlock
and....
ECB Decision – No Change
The ECB decided not to do anything at yesterday's meeting – the terse press release reads as follows:
„At today’s meeting, which was held in Brdo pri Kranju, the Governing Council of the ECB decided that the interest rate on the main refinancing operations and the interest rates on the marginal lending facility and the deposit facility will remain unchanged at 0.75%, 1.50% and 0.00% respectively.”
A webcast of the subsequent press conference can be watched here. Mario Draghi once again underscored his unhappiness with the 'broken transmission mechanism' and the 'convertibility premium' haunting peripheral sovereign bond markets, but again stressed that his hands remain tied until applications for aid are filed.
In a summary, Bloomberg reports:
“European Central Bank President Mario Draghi signaled European governments can’t expect much more help from him until they make the next move.
Draghi said nine times during a 54-minute press conference in Slovenia yesterday that the ECB won’t start intervening in bond markets until governments like Spain request a bailout and agree to conditions. He also ruled out allowing the ECB to take losses in any further Greek debt restructuring and damped speculation of another ECB interest-rate cut.“Draghi’s message to governments was that he’s not going to do any more for the time being,” said Jacques Cailloux, chief European economist at Nomura International Plc in London. “The ECB is ready, if needed, but their preference is probably not to have to intervene at all.”
That message puts the onus firmly on Spain to request aid from Europe’s bailout fund and sign up to conditions — a pre- requisite for the ECB to consider bond purchases. The prime ministers of Italy, Spain, and France may have Draghi’s imperative on their minds when they meet at a summit of Mediterranean leaders in Malta today.
Draghi said his bond-purchase plan, called Outright Monetary Transactions, has already lowered borrowing costs for sovereigns across Europe. “Today we are ready with our OMT,” he said. “Now it’s really in the hands of governments.”
(emphasis added)
In short, the stalemate persists – and Mariano Rajoy is basically in 'Zugzwang'. This is to say, if he were playing a chess game, he's now in the kind of situation in which it is to his disadvantage to be the one who has to make a move. No matter which move he makes, it can only be a bad one from his perspective.
Good and Bad News for Spain
On the positive side though, the Spanish government managed to get the regions to agree to the overarching national deficit cutting plan. This means they have pledged to stick to the budget deficit targets set for them by the central government.
“Spain’s 17 regional governments agreed on Tuesday to stick to budget deficit targets set by the central government, giving Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy some breathing space as he faces pressure from investors and his European partners to clean up Spain’s banks and public finances.
After a meeting in Madrid with leaders of the regional governments, Mr. Rajoy said, “Spain was giving a good message.” He added that he was “very grateful to everybody” for backing his government’s budget plans and avoiding a full-blown confrontation between the central and regional governments.”
Even the simmering confrontation with Catalonia was put on the backburner for now, as the Catalan leader Artur Mas didn't raise the secession issue at the meeting and left Madrid without issuing a statement on the matter.
However, a number of fresh bad news have come to light as well. One item that has recently received some attention is that the government's tax take from corporations has fallen off a cliff, as smaller businesses are failing in droves as a result of the depression, while bigger ones are moving to new domiciles abroad. All in all, corporate taxes have now declined by nearly two thirds from the peak.
Another problem is that even the governor of the Bank of Spain is now saying that the government's budget is based on an over-optimistic economic growth forecast. This is ratcheting up the pressure on Rajoy, who of course remains extremely reluctant to apply for ESM aid. This will remain so for as long as the afterglow of the ECB's 'OMT announcement effect' continues to linger in the markets.
“Luis Maria Linde, who was appointed as Governor in May, said Madrid’s official forecasts seemed out of step internationally and there was risk of “slippage.”
He said that Spain needed to impose more austerity measures, on top of the billions of euros of cuts already announced, in order to meet the 2013 deficit target of 4.5pc of GDP.
“The information now available for the state up to August indicates there are risks of slippage on the goal fixed for this year,” he told a parliamentary committee. “This outlook…is certainly optimistic in comparison with the outlook shared by the majority of international organisations and analysts.”
His comments clashed with Luis de Guindos, Spain’s finance minister, who insisted that the country “doesn’t need a bail-out at all.” In a speech in London that was interrupted by anti-austerity protesters, Mr Guindos said Spain was “doing its homework”. He said it was “crazy” to suggest the eurozone would fall apart.”
(emphasis added)
When de Guindos delivered his speech in London and said that 'Spain doesn't need a bailout at all', he was confronted with full-on laughter from his audience.
We conclude from all this that things are most probably going to evolve as follows: Spain's government will continue to drag its feet until the markets lose patience and force interest rates and CDS spreads higher again. Then the bailout application will be lodged.
Of course things do not have to play out in this manner – we cannot know the future with certainty. This is merely what we think is the most likely sequence of events given the current state of market data and political contingencies. Note that while Spain's economy remains under great pressure, a number of adjustments have already taken place. For instance, Spain's export sector seems to be doing well and has definitely regained some of its competitiveness. This is however overshadowed by the troubles in the real estate sector and the ongoing zombification of the banking system due to the bust.
Euro Area Banks – Much More Capital Needed
Speaking of banks, the European Banking Authority is telling euro area banks to get €200 billion in new capital in order to comply with tough new capital rules. In fact, the amounts would have been even higher based on 2011 data, if systemic risk buffers were to be taken into account:
The EU’s 44 biggest banks would have needed an extra 312 billion euros in their core reserves when taking into account additional surcharges to account for systemic risk if the rules had been in place in 2011, the EBA saidlast week.”
This tells us a lot about how rickety the fractionally reserved banking system in Europe actually is, given the well-known tendency of regulators to go along with the banks in downplaying the risks. It also means that there is little chance of a credit boom beginning anytime soon in the euro area, which is of course a blessing. The last thing that is needed is yet another credit boom that consumes even more scarce capital (although there is a residual danger of a boom getting started in the countries currently not subject to crisis, as the ECB's loose policy has goosed their money supply growth rates).
****
http://www.zerohedge.com/contributed/2012-10-04/incredibly-ballooning-bailout-cyprus
The Incredibly Ballooning Bailout Of Cyprus
- Corruption
- European Central Bank
- Eurozone
- Greece
- Gross Domestic Product
- International Monetary Fund
- Saudi Arabia
- Unemployment
Wolf Richter www.testosteronepit.com
Cypriot President Christofias dug in his heels. On Greek TV. Not behind closed doors with the Troika, the austerity gang from the European Commission, the IMF, and the ECB that have performed such miracles in Greece. But as Cyprus veers toward bankruptcy, his game of playing the Russians against the Troika has fallen apart, banks are in worse condition than imagined, and the bailout amounts jumped again. How can a tiny country get in so much trouble in such a short time?
The real-estate and construction bubble, fed by corruption and abetted by banks, burst two years ago. Home sales and prices have collapsed. Some 130,000 homeowners (in a country of 840,000 souls) are tangled up in a nationwide title-deed scandal [Another Eurozone Country Bites the Dust]. The Troika estimated that 50,000 homes would be dumped on the market—though only 4,876 homes were sold during the first nine months of the year! Losses have gutted banks. Unemployment has reached record levels. And the construction industry, once a major employer, is being annihilated.
The index of building contracts, after a two-year downhill slide, has reached the lowest point in its history, and “activity is expected to continue dropping,” lamented the Federation of Associations of Building Contractors (OSEOK). Contractors are going out of business. Over the last four months, the morass has deepened. And now there are only enough pending construction projects for seven months, and after that, there are no projects.
Locked out from the financial markets since early summer 2011, Cyprus was bailed out by Russia last November with a €2.5 billion loan. In June, as the banks began to topple under a mountain of Greek debt and rotting mortgages, Cyprus asked for a bailout. The Troika took a look and figured €6 billion for the banks and €4 billion for the government. €10 billion in total. Alas, in August, Central Bank Governor Panicos Demetriades told parliament that the banksalone would need €12 billion! And the rumor consensus has settled on €15 billion for both the banks and the government.
Then Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov spilled the beans last week: Cyprus would indeed seek a €15 billion bailout from the Troika, and an additional €5 billion from Russia, for a total of €20 billion. A vertigo-inducing 107% of GDP.
But he cautioned that Russia and the Troika would need to coordinate the loans—thus throwing a monkey wrench into Christofias’ efforts to use the negotiations with Russia as a lever against the Troika to get a better deal and more lenient conditions.
Conditions that the Troika had already spelled out in a memorandum. Which was promptly leaked. It included measures that would make Cyprus a more efficient and competitive economy. Cypriots have seen how well that has worked in Greece. So, a whackat the bloated public sector: privatization of state-owned enterprises, a 15% cut in the public payroll by the end of 2013, a 10% cut in benefits, elimination of the automatic Cost of Living Adjustments (CoLA) that index salaries to inflation, and an increase of contributions to pension plans. The CoLA elimination would also hit unionized private sector employees, as would the elimination of the 13th month salary.
“You cannot tell someone they won’t receive a 13th salary. It automatically means you paralyze the market” declared communist President Christofias during the TV interview yesterday. “I can assure you, I will not sign any memorandum which scraps CoLA. The same applies to two or three other measures.” Hence, no privatizations, no public sector payroll reductions.... But he also made some sense: “What happened with the banks was a crime,” he said.
He would, however, try to cooperate with the Troika. “We aren’t just saying ‘no’ to them,” he added. “We are giving them counterproposals.” His cabinet met on Wednesday to finalize them. They focus apparently on a VAT increase, a luxury car tax, sin taxes on cigarettes and alcohol, disincentives for public sector workers to take early retirement, and a 5% wage cut for those earning over €1,500—the mindboggling phenomenon of a government cutting private sector pay plans is something we have already seen in Greece.
Yet, Cyprus has something that Greece and other Eurozone debt-sinners don’t have: lots of Russians with money. The island has become an offshore haven for their businesses, and the money-flows are staggering. For that amazing twist to the bailout story, read.... The Russian Connection.
And here is a thought: there is little that would rock the oil world more than a revolution in Saudi Arabia. And with a coming leadership crisis, it is becoming all too likely. Read.... Why an Islamic Revolution in Saudi Arabia Is a Surefire Way to Send Oil to $300 a Barrel.
and.....
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-10-04/eu-said-to-doubt-viability-of-spain-s-2013-deficit-cut-target
While European Central Bank President Mario Draghi said yesterday the ECB is ready to start buying bonds of sovereigns that qualify for aid, officials from Spain, Germany and now the EU have damped expectations of a rescue this week. Rajoy on Oct. 2 denied reports a rescue request would come this week. Economy Minister Luis de Guindos last night said no bailout was needed.
There’s “a potential slowdown in Spain’s application for a European program,” Thomas Costerg, an economist at Standard Chartered Bank in London, said yesterday by e-mail. “There is a rising fear that the 2013 budget and the stress tests may have been some sort of window dressing to get European assistance.”
Olli Rehn, the European commissioner in charge of policing budget rules, told Spanish officials their plans to reduce the shortfall to 4.5 percent of gross domestic product next year are based on excessively optimistic assumptions about economic growth, two people familiar with the issue said. Central bank governor Luis Maria Linde, who met Rehn on his Oct. 1 visit to Madrid, echoed that view in comments to lawmakers yesterday.
Bonds Climb
Spanish bonds rose for the first day in three, with the 10- year yield falling 13 basis points to 5.77 percent as of 12:09 p.m. in Madrid. The spread to German bunds narrowed 17 points to 429 points while the differential over Italian debt closed by 5 points.
Spain’s 2013 budget assumes the economy will shrink 0.5 percent, less than the 1.3 percent median contraction predicted by 21 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg. Linde, the Bank of Spain chief, said targets were “certainly optimistic” in testimony to the parliament’s budget committee.
“The macroeconomic assumptions underlying the budget shouldn’t be a source of uncertainty and lack of credibility,” Deputy Finance Minister Fernando Jimenez Latorre argued when he took his turn in front of the committee today.
Latorre said a larger-than-expected contraction next year won’t affect Spain’s ability to meet its budget commitments. Spain is still analyzing the possibility of asking for a bailout even though the procedures involved are “complex,” he added.
More Austerity
Weaker economic performance would widen the deficit, forecast at 6.3 percent of GDP in 2012, forcing the government to impose more austerity or plead for a looser target. Spain has been let out of its 2013 commitments before. European governments in July raised the deficit target from 3 percent.
Linde urged Rajoy to prepare additional austerity measures to ensure Spain meets the deficit obligations, which may determine whether EU officials grant financial support.
“Given the importance of achieving this, additional measures that would make it possible should be considered,” the governor said.
The 2013 budget, released Sept. 27, included the fifth set of tax increases and spending cuts since Rajoy took office in December. Public opposition has grown fiercer each time, climaxing last week with two days of protests in Madrid.
Already tapping 100 billion euros ($130 billion) in aid to overhaul its banks, Spain is considering a broader European support package to shore up the government’s finances.
The ECB’s offer of unlimited bond purchases “helped to alleviate tensions over the past few weeks,” Draghi said yesterday after the monthly meeting of the ECB’s governing council. “Now it’s really in the hands of governments.”
and trading " technical issues " today........
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-10-05/trading-halted-again-all-nyse-liffe-commodities
Trading Halted (Again) On All NYSE Liffe Commodities
For the second time this week, NYSE Liffe has halted all London Commodities, Paris Commodities, and London Universal Stock Futures trading - due to a 'technical issue'. Simply remarkable...
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-10-05/indias-stock-exchange-closes-after-state-bank-flash-crash
India's Stock Exchange 'Closes' After State Bank 'Flash-Crash'
While we have grown accustomed to the daily gyrations on mega-volume in the US equity markets, it seems the HFT-virus has spread as far afield as India this evening. India's National Stock Exchange was halted - with no price dissemination - as State Bank of India plunged over 14% in seconds on massive relative volume (and HDFC and Infosys also fell), dragging the Nifty Index down 3%. Of course, the 'error' is being investigated and SBIN has recovered its losses...
- *STATE BANK OF INDIA SHARES FALL 14% ON NATIONAL STOCK EXCHANGE
- *INDIA'S NIFTY INDEX EXTENDS DECLINE TO 2.8%
- *NATIONAL STOCK EXCHANGE SAYS VERIFYING SOURCE OF PRICE ERROR
- *NATIONAL STOCK EXCHANGE SAYS NIFTY INDEX LEVELS NOT UPDATING
- *INDIA'S NATIONAL STOCK EXCHANGE RESUMES TRADING
- *INDIA'S SENSEX INDEX ERASES LOSS; GAINS 0.3% IN MUMBAI
- *INDIA'S NSE SAYS `LOOKING INTO' THE FREAK TRADE
Sigh!
State Bank Of India - oops!
State Bank of India (smaller crash) close-up...
Source: Bloomberg
and.....
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/debt-crisis-live/9588503/Debt-crisis-live.html
11.20 Is the German powerhouse losing steam? Economy ministry figures out this morning show that industry orders fell more than forecast in August. Economists polled by Reuters had expected a fall of 0.5pc, but they fell 1.3pc month-on-month. On the year, they fell 4.8pc.
11.11 Ireland's central bank has said today that the government should speed up its recovery programme, arguing that this would encourage a faster recovery in the economy and the jobs market.
The central bank said Ireland's success so far in meeting the targets under its EU/IMF bailout means it does not need to increase the scale of the cutbacks. But, it added that accelerating the pace could be helpful:
Meeting these targets has helped Ireland to go some way towards re-establishing its reputation for credible policymaking and, in turn, has contributed significantly to lowering Irish bond yields.
...[But] there is a case for getting the adjustment over more quickly. This would shorten the already lengthy period of uncertainty which has been bad in itself and has doubtless slowed investment and other spending plans.
The central bank cut its forecast for 2012 gross domestic product growth to 0.5pc from the 0.7pc it estimated three months ago.
10.34 Another meeting is in the offing. Angela Merkel is apparently due to fly to Athens on Tuesday to meet Antonis Samaras; topics they will cover include Greece, the eurozone and bilateral relations.
10.27 Given the French statistics' office halving its growth forecast for this year to 0.2pc (see 08.32), M&G's comment on the 'toxic French economic cocktail' seems especially pertinent.
Jim Leaviss of M&G writes about several ingredients in that cocktail, including that German growth has tended to be stronger than French growth over recent years; France looks more like periphery than core on its current account deficit; Spanish and Greek labour costs are adjusting, but France looks uncompetitive.
Here's his graph illustrating France's current account deficit versus Netherlands, Germany, Italy and Spain:
He writes about the challenging French fiscal outlook:
Delivering growth (or defaulting) has always been the most successful method of reducing government indebtedness, and even an optimistic 2% per year real growth rate (pencilled in by the government from 2014) doesn’t deliver a significant reduction in the debt to GDP ratio – certainly the 40% to 50% level that we used to associate with a AAA rated economy seems a long way away.
It may be that the aggressive tightening in French government bond yields to those of AAA rated (for the time being) Germany has gone far enough. There are plenty of economic and social buy-in risks to come for France – let us not forget that Spain’s Rajoy was also elected on a platform of fiscal consolidation, and it took less than a year for its population to change its mind about that.
10.04 Those eurozone officials have been vocal this morning. A senior eurozone official also said that the EU summit on October 18 to 19 will not take any decisions on Greece because the preparatory work on Greek reforms will not be ready by then. "I am extremely confident there will be no such decisions at the summit," he said.
09.37 Luis de Guindos' assertion that Spain "does not need a bailout at all" (see 08.08) sparked laughter when the country's finance minister addressed students at the London School of Economics last night. CNBC has the full story on the bailout giggles here.
But, he has been (partly) vindicated by a senior eurozone official today who said that a request from the Spanish government for a bailout is "not imminent". He added that market conditions do not call for any bailout programme from Spain.
09.03 There is speculation this morning that two of Greece's biggest banks are in talks over a merger. Reuters cites a report on news website To Vima, which suggests that such a deal would have the blessing of the Greek government and Bank of Greece.
To Vima reported that another option could be a triple-merger of National Bank, Eurobank and small state-controlled lender, Hellenic Postbank.
08.44 Figures out from Spain's National Statistics Institute show that the country's industrial output slipped 3.2pc in August, marking the 12th straight month of slowing production.
08.32 Late last night, France's national statistics institute halved its growth forecast for this year to 0.2pc.
The French economy is stuck in neutral, said the head of INSEE's forecasting unit Cedric Audenis.
"It is not in 'drive' like the United States, but neither 'in reverse' like the eurozone overall" which is in recession, he added.
08.15 Greek premier, Antonis Samaras, has given a stark interview to Handelsblatt today. The German version is here and the Google translate version in English is here.
In a "dramatic" interview, he compared his country's situation with the Weimar Republic and warned of the consequences of unemployment for democracy.
He added that society "as a whole" was threatened by the extreme left-wing populists and "by what has occurred in our country than ever before: the rise of a right-wing extremist, one might say fascist, neo-Nazi party".
Samaras warned that his country could not endure many more deep cuts, saying the "previous cuts already go to the bone".
Reuters has some more details on his interview. They have taken the line that Samaras warned that his country could not manage beyond November without the next tranche of international aid and suggested the ECB could help by easing the terms of its Greek debt holdings. Reuterswrites:
"The key is liquidity. That is why the next credit tranche is so important for us," Samaras told the business daily Handelsblatt. Asked how long Greece could manage without it, he said: "Until the end of November. Then the cash box is empty."
The European Central Bank could help by accepting lower interest rates on its existing Greek debt holdings "or it could approve a rollover when these bonds mature", he said.
08.11 Mr de Guindos's speech was interrupted by a small group of protesters chanting: "They are not representing us" as they unfurled a banner saying: "Spain for Sale":
A member of the audience asks a question as protesters chant slogans against Spain's government at the London School of Economics on Thursday (Photo: AP).
08.08 Spain doesn't need a bail-out "at all". Those were the words of Spanish economy minister Luis de Guindos last night as he addressed an audience at the London School of Economics.
Mr de Guindos added:
We are going to take all the correct steps over the next months [...] I would not undervalue the political will of the members of the eurozone.
and......
http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_wsite1_15805_05/10/2012_464693
Samaras raises alarm about lack of liquidity, threat to democracy
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"The key is liquidity. That is why the next credit tranche is so important for us,» Samaras told the business daily Handelsblatt. Asked how long Greece could manage without it, he said: «Until the end of November. Then the cash box is empty."
The European Central Bank could help by accepting lower interest rates on its existing Greek debt holdings «or it could approve a rollover when these bonds mature», he said.
"I could also imagine the recapitalization of Greek banks as is being considered for Spain, which would be not accounted for on its state debts but carried out directly via the ESM. That would be a significant relief,» said Samaras.
However, in a press conference on Thursday, ECB president Mario Draghi said that a rollover of the Greek debt held by the central bank would be considered “monetary financing” of Greece and therefore against the lender’s regulations.
In his interview with Handelsblatt, Samaras also stressed the fragile political and social situation in Greece, likening it to Germany’s Weimar Republic.
The prime minister stressed the importance of high unemployment and the rise of neofascist Golden Dawn as destabilizing factors.
"Greek democracy is perhaps facing its biggest challenge,» he said.
Samaras said that if the coalition government fails in its task, “chaos awaits” for the country.
The premier also suggested that Chancellor Angela Merkel is “always welcome” to visit Athens. “We greatly appreciate that Germany and the Europeans are helping us at this difficult time,” he said.
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