Thursday, July 12, 2012

The Eurozone - compared with a YoYo which springs up everytime a summit happens and falls in between.

So how long this time? Economist Wolfgang Münchau argues in today's FT that it could be 20 years before we solve the eurozone crisis: "The consensus among observers had been that the EU had taken an important step in the right direction by agreeing a pathway towards a banking union, but that they did not do enough on crisis resolution. I disagree with that statement. I think it was a very large step – in the wrong direction. The summit made a concrete crisis resolution decision contingent on a future decision, which will be even harder to reach, and thus even more likely to fail". They agreed that there shall be no common bank overcapitalization until a full banking union is established. And the Bundesbank has reminded us that the latter is not possible without a political union. The logical implication is that we won't solve the crisis for the next 20 years. What we know now is that Germany will not agree to mutualised deposit insurance. It cannot even agree to give the European Stability Mechanism a banking licence so that it can leverage itself. If Germany cannot do the minimum necessary now, why should anybody think it can agree a political union? This is less credible than the promise by an alcoholic to give up drinking in five years.

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