The Eurozone is heating up again, as the realisation dawns that previous settlements were merely uneasy hiatuses.
The immediate problem is Cyprus, which finds itself on the verge of default due to contamination from Greece. The country, a small island nation in the Mediterranean, has close historical and financial links with crisis-stricken Athens, and was forced to seek aid from the EU last year. Last month, the Wall Street Journal‘s Stephen Filder received confirmation in Davos from Olli Rehn, the EU’s economics commissioner, a rescue program for the country will require “substantially reducing government and bank debt” — in other words, a default.
Such a default will be problematic, because Cyprus, more so than most troubled Eurozone countries to date, operates as an off-shore banker for many of the world’s super-rich — particularly, in this case, Russians. The country is likely to find itself stuck between two unpalatable options: either safeguarding its banking sector from losses by imposing huge burdens on its populace, or risking a run on the banks from overseas as foreign depositors try to get their money out.
There had been hope that the country may be able to get a bailout from the EU without causing too much damage to its domestic banking operation, but over the weekend, that became less likely. The SPD, the German opposition party, pushed for the country to be forced to consolidate its banks before any bailout would be agreed. According to Reuters, Merkel needs the support of the SPD to pass any bailout through the Bundestag (and of course, the EU needs the support of Germany before any bailout can go ahead) so this objection carries real weight.
The Cypriot problem is nasty, but largely internal; the country is too small to have any real contagion effects. The same cannot be said of Italy and Spain, both of which are sources of increased uncertainty.
In Italy, Silvio’s back! The former prime minister — who, if he were anyone else, would surely be the “disgraced” former prime minister — is running for office on a platform of tax cuts (€4bn of them) over austerity. His coalition is in second place right now to the centre-left grouping, but its standing is improving — and the markets appear to be getting jumpy at that fact.
Berlusconi is being hampered by the fact that he no longer controls Italian media in the way he used to, but even so, a win for him is still alarmingly possible. (Regardless of the effect of deficit-funded tax-cuts on national economies, Berlusconi is unlikely to plough a viable economic course for Italy).
And in Spain, prime minister Mariano Rajoy has been accused of running an illegal slush fund. Yesterday afternoon, Rajoy issued a not-entirely-convincing rebuttal, telling a joint press conference with Angela Merkel that:
I repeat what I said Saturday: everything that has been said about me and my colleagues in the party is untrue, except for some things that have been published by some media outlets.
Merkel, “visibly upset”, was also asked about the corruption allegations, and emphasised that “what is important is the relationship between the two governments”.
Whatever happens to Rajoy, Berloscuni, and even Cyprus, the flurry of attention and fear generated by what ought to be business as usual for politics (except, maybe, the Cyprus problem) demonstrates how uneasy the situation in Europe remains. While we haven’t heard a huge amount about the crisis recently, as the big minds in economics get distracted by talk of robots (not that the potential problems there aren’t huge either), the situation is by no means fixed. The continent remains in much the same straits as Britain, but with the added straightjacket of a unified currency and intransigent Germany dampening hope.