Politics

The Greek government has now been boxed in by the “no” referendum vote and is unable to make the kinds of concessions a “yes” vote would have allowed. Meanwhile, the Eurogroup’s thinking about the manageability of Grexit is coalescing…

In the wake of the decisive “No” referendum vote by the Greek electorate and related events, the negotiating landscape has shifted substantially. The negotiating position of the institutions now looks untenable. But this by no way changes…

The Absolute Return Letter, July 2015 “In a world that is changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.” Mark Zuckerberg Greece on the brink A Greek, an Irishman and a Portuguese walk…

The easy part of gauging likely outcomes in the Greek sovereign debt crisis was predicting default within the eurozone. But now that this has happened, the situation becomes murkier and it is unclear what will happen next. Below I will put…

I know I keep saying that economics is not a morality play. But when it comes to Greece, I can find no other satisfactory explanation for what is going on. I've reminded everyone before about Irving Fisher's famous observation: "The more…

Greece has reached the end of the line. Its debt repayment schedule is so large in early June that it will definitely run out of money without a deal. And judging from the latest negotiations, a deal that is mutually agreeable is not on the…

Greece is expected to submit a more complete list of reforms in order to free up funds so the country can service its obligations. Four times the Greek government has provided lists and four times the European group of finance minister…

By Michael Pettis When Isaac, an editor at Foreign Policy, sent me an email two weeks ago asking if I could write a piece on the new Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), I quickly wrote back promising 1,200 words within a few…

There is a legal concept called "odious debts." It can be traced back more than a century. The US helped create a precedent for it by denying Cuba's responsibility for the debt incurred under Spanish colonial rule. The concept took on…

Finnish society, like many other European ones, is in the throes of a major transition. More debate needs to be held on what to do to facilitate the transition, and in the meantime deficit spending to make investments in future productivity…