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This is pretty much the headlines for the day -all in one collection.
European shares dive into the red as Greece warns 'we could run out of money in a couple of weeks'
- FTSE 100 index falls 1.6% to 6,915.66
- Paris and Frankfurt stock markets also 2% down
- Yanis Varoufakis warned his country's financial situation is 'terribly urgent'
- Greece transferred €750m in debt interest to IMF ahead of a deadline
- If debt-ridden country defaults it could be forced out of eurozone
10
May, 2015
Shares
across Europe have dive into the red after a warning came from
Greece's finance minister that the debt-laden nation could run out of
money in a couple of weeks.
Yanis
Varoufakis warned his country's financial situation is 'terribly
urgent' after eurozone finance ministers met in Brussels yesterday to
discuss the final €7.2bn tranche of Greece's €240bn European
Union / International Monetary Fund bailout.
Greece
is struggling to meet repayment obligations and eurozone ministers
said Greece had made 'progress' but more work was needed. Earlier,
Greece began the transfer of €750m in debt interest to the IMF,
ahead of a deadline.
The
gloom spread to the trading desks of the major European stock
markets: in London the FTSE 100 index fell more than 2 per cent at
one point but recovered slightly to stand 114.2 points or 1.6 per
cent down at 6,915.66, while the blue-chip indices in Paris and
Frankfurt were also 1-1.6 per cent off their opening marks.
But
Jasper Lawler at CMC Markets said fear over a bond market rout is
also causing the collapse of European stocks.
Gathering
storm: Talks are highly unlikely to end in a new funding package for
the government in Athens
'German
bunds yields are rising faster than US treasuries and closing the
yield advantage of US debt over European debt,' he said. 'US
dollar-denominated assets are now becoming relatively less appealing
than the equivalent European assets.
'This
unwinding of the yield differential between treasuries and bunds is
driving EUR/USD higher which in turn is causing a drop in the German
DAX stock index.'
He
expects Wall Street to open 'considerably lower' as a result.
The
pound was flat against the euro at €1.39 after making rapid gains
from the €1.34 rate it was trading at before the surprise general
election result on Friday. Sterling fared better against the dollar,
rising 1.5 cents to $1.57
Mr
Varoufakis told reporters in Brussels last night, 'The liquidity
issue is a terribly urgent issue. It's common knowledge, let's not
beat around the bush. From the perspective [of timing], we are
talking about the next couple of weeks.'
Greece has been lurching closer towards a humiliating exit from the single currency bloc.The talks with creditors are unlikely to end in a new funding package for the government in Athens as many key issues are still unresolved.
Fears are mounting that Greece will default on its debts – possibly forcing the country out of the euro.
The last time the Eurogroup of finance ministers met, in Riga last month, Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis was branded ‘a time-waster, a gambler and an amateur’.
Those discussions broke down after the Greek government failed to offer the reforms required to fix its economy in exchange for fresh financial support.
Greece desperately needs the next tranche of its bailout to survive – worth around £5.2billion – but is at loggerheads with Europe and the IMF over what is required to release the funds.
If Greece does not sign up to painful reforms in order to secure fresh funding, it may not be able to pay the £1.8billion it owes in salaries and pensions at the end of this month.
Timo
Soini, who could become Finland’s next finance minister after the
eurosceptic party he leads entered a governing coalition, said it
would make sense for Greece to leave the common currency.
Asked
if he would like to see Greece thrown out of the eurozone, he said:
‘That would perhaps be the clearest option for everybody, also for
the Greeks.’
Italian
finance minister Pier Carlo Padoan warned that ‘time is running
out’ Greece.
Dutch
finance minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem, who chairs the Eurogroup, said
Greece has not done enough to earn more aid.
‘We
have made progress, but we are not very close to an agreement,’ he
said. ‘We will need more time, but I don’t know how much.’
Greece repaying €750mn in interest, will run out of cash in ‘weeks’ without debt deal
Athens
has begun repaying some €750mn in debt interest to its creditors,
just days before deadline, but says it may default by next month if
the liquidity issue is not resolved. Meanwhile a Eurogroup meeting,
while optimistic, produced no new debt deal.
“The
liquidity issue is a terribly urgent issue. It’s common knowledge,
let’s not beat around the bush,” said Greek finance minister
Yanis Varoufakis following another round of talks in Brussels. “From
the perspective of timing, we are talking about the next couple of
weeks.”
Greece
owes external creditors more than €320 billion, and is counting on
a final €7.2 billion International Monetary Fund tranche, which has
so far been suspended, to simply cover its daily salary and pension
obligations, which amount to approximately €1.5 billion a month.
But
Europe and the IMF are demanding that Greece reforms its public
sector, and cracks down on tax evasion, as well as adopting a
sustainable budget, before it releases the money.
Greece says it faces bankruptcy in weeks
Macedonia unrest: ‘Warning to Skopje against new Turkish pipeline’
Macedonia
has become important to the US as it could become the only way for
Russia’s proposed Turkish Stream pipeline to reach Central Europe,
which Washington does not want, political analyst Srdja Trifkovic
told RT.
Clashes
in Macedonia Raise Concerns Among NATO, EU Members
Today,
for the first time in 2 years, after visiting Saudi Arabia last week,
John Kerry met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in the
highest-level U.S. visit in two years, and certainly since the start
of the Ukraine presidential coup which has since devolved into a
civil war.
Avoiding further harm to US-Russia relations ‘absolutely necessary’ – Lavrov’
The
Russian Foreign Minister has said it is “absolutely necessary” to
avoid steps that could further harm the ailing relations between
Russia and the US. He spoke at a media briefing following lengthy
talks with his US counterpart.
US
Secretary of State John Kerry made his official visit to Sochi on
Tuesday, the first visit by a senior American official to Russia
since the start of the Ukrainian turmoil in 2014 and the resulting
plummet in relations between Moscow and Washington.
US
Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in Russia to meet with Russian
President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday. The unexpected meeting shows
that Americans need cooperation with Russia and that the latter
cannot just be isolated from ‘big politics’, DWN reported.
Is
Finland on Course to Recognize Donetsk People's Republic?
US Training Nazis, Western Media Providing Cover
It
has become a popular position both in the mainstream and
pseudo-alternative media, and among those on the Russophobic left, to
downplay the significant fascist influence on the political and
military institutions, as well as the cultural character of the “New
Ukraine.” Quite often, the reality of Ukrainian fascism is obscured
by vague assertions that such conclusions are merely “Russian
propaganda,” that they are simply Kremlin talking points, and not
statements of objective reality.
Putin
sent troops to Ukraine, spent billions of rubles on fueling the war
and is now lying to the whole world. Russian opposition has released
a report called "Putin.War", which contains "secret"
findings of Boris Nemtsov. Activists say they finished the
investigation the politician started some 2 month before his murder
in February. Although we'd call it a digest of media articles, social
media posts and subjective opinion with no real sources.
Just
days after Japanese PM Shinzo Abe leaves Washington (having stepped
up his nation's military assertiveness), The Wall Street Journal
reports that the US Secretary of Defense has asked staff for military
options in the South China Sea (as we have detailed China's land
reclamation efforts):
*U.S.
MAY USE MILITARY TO CONFRONT CHINA IN SPRATLY ISLANDS DISPUTE: WSJ
American Cops Are More Heavily Armed than Front Line U.S. Combat Soldiers In Active War Zones
Rafael
Rivera - who served in the U.S. Army for seven years - writes:
The police in Ferguson have better armor and weaponry than my men and I did in the middle of a war. And Ferguson isn’t alone — police departments across the US are armed for war.
The
Hill notes
[Senator] McCaskill pointed out that in some places local police departments are more heavily armed than the National Guard.
Someone identifying himself as an 82nd Airborne Army veteran, observing the Ferguson police scene, comment[ed] that “We rolled lighter than that in an actual warzone”
Constitutional
and civil rights lawyer John Whitehead notes that homeland security
officers within the
U.S. have three
times as much ammunition as
front-line soldiers in Afghanistan (and possess a type of ammunition
that is banned in
war zones).
Many combat veterans have since pointed out that the SWAT officers are more heavily armed and outfitted than they themselves were while patrolling the streets of Iraq or Afghanistan.
Indeed, many veterans
have noted that
American police are more heavily armed than they were when serving on
the front line (click
for 9 tweets which
I can't figure out how to ebed).
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