crisis

The European Union is an existential crisis because its crowning achievement, the single currency, has come under assault from all sides. The continued existence of the Euro has even been called into question as country after country within…

Back to the Willem Buiter interview in Financiëele Dagblad. Here Buiter continues with some comments on Jeroen Dijsselbloem's admission that bail-ins will be the preferred vehicle for conducting rescues going forward so as not to burden the…

Here are some quick points on the Cyprus deal which the Eurogroup agreed to last night. The agreement outline is very much along the lines of what I have been recommending regarding bail-in guidelines and is therefore a much fairer deal…

The Cyprus bailout deal has the following terms as approved by the Eurogroup:

Editor's Note: The Eurogroup released the following statement moments ago in connection with the banking and sovereign debt crisis in Cyprus. The Eurogroup has reached an agreement with the Cypriot authorities on the key elements necessary…

It occurs to me that the sovereign debt levels in Cyprus are unsustainable. As I have said previously, I believe this will lead to a government bond default. And given that capital controls already exist, the move to eurozone exit is much…

Paul De Grauwe, a professor at the London School of Economics, told Tom Keene on "Bloomberg Surveillance" today that the euro area is at risk because "so many big mistakes have been made." De Grauwe went on to say that the "ineptitude of…

The latest information on Cyprus is that the ECB has told the Cypriots it could no longer extend the ELA facility being used by the now bankrupt Cypriot financial institutions. Cyprus has until Monday to find the funds to support their…

A lot has been made about the fact that Russian money was in Cyprus and that Cyprus was an offshore tax haven. A lot of people are claiming all of this money is mafia-related or in Cyprus to dodge taxes. And it is this claim, especially in…

Regarding Cyprus, recently I heard someone claim that depositors are not creditors of a bank despite the fact that deposits are bank liabilities. This is bollocks. Depositors are indeed creditors, particularly in Europe where they are…