Greece debt crisis: ECB 'to end' bank emergency lending • Hacker News Board

Re: Greece debt crisis: ECB 'to end' bank emergency lending

#21

Post by jeroen94704 » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 12:02 PM UTC

TazeTSchnitzel wrote: post #6

imaginenore wrote: post #3

It's about time. Greece has been behaving like a gambling addict, asking for money to repay the old debts only to waste them in expensive restaurants, buying iPhones, and gambling even more.

Gambling addict? What an incredibly unfair and childish characterisation. Greece is not a person, Greece is a nation state. It has implemented severe fiscal cutbacks after being forced to by its creditors. Cutbacks which have ruined the country's economy, massively increased poverty, and made it more difficult to pay back its debts. Now its people have voted in a government that wishes to make different reforms. Ones…

While I am certainly sympathetic to the Greeks for the hardships they have faced and will undoubtedly face in the years to come, it is incredibly unfair to deny the Greeks' own responsibility in all this.

This entire mess started with Greece not having its finances in order, and essentially lying about this for years to the rest of the Eurogroup. After it became clear how dire the situation was, the Eurogroup stepped in and helped Greece by giving them money (LOTS of money). Had the Eurogroup not done this, Greece would have defaulted on its debts years ago, and the country would have gone bankrupt.

Now if someone offers to help you by giving you money, provided you meet certain conditions, you can either accept and comply with the conditions, or you can refuse. The fact is that Greece gladly accepted the billions upon billions of euros, and the conditions that money came with.

I am fully aware that the measures demanded by Greece's creditors are tough. Some would say it is doubtful whether they are actually effective at all. And the demanded measures are certainly driven partly by political motives. All this is true.

But it is mind-boggling to me that after the Eurogroup provided several hundred billion euro's in aid to Greece, anyone would turn around and claim the current crisis is in no way the Greeks' own fault.

Re: Greece debt crisis: ECB 'to end' bank emergency lending

#22

Post by raesene9 » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 12:02 PM UTC

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #2

tl;dr ECB has leaked to BBC they will cut off emergency lending that covers the panic withdrawals. This will kill the deal and force a grexit, even before 5 July referendum. However French PM does not think they have enough independence to do that. So we have a democratic nation potentially forced to leave Euro, after democratically deciding it no longer wants the austerity imposed, being forced to leave by non democ…

I'm not sure that the ECBs action is the cause so much as the effect.

My understanding of this was that the greek banks are (without ECB help) insolvent and have been for some time. They are unable to raise capital on the open market, as the open market has decided that they are not confident enough in those banks to lend them money.

As a result the Emergency Liquidity Assitance from the ECB has been used, but that was only provided on the basis that the greek banks were solvent but had temporary liquidity problems.

As far as I understand it, as soon as Greece is no longer in a bailout Program (Tuesday by current reckoning) those banks will not be solvent any more (they hold large amounts of Greek government debt), and ELA can't (without some form of change of rules for the ECB) continue.

The ECB is just following it's rules and it's been known that this approach is where they would likely need to go for some time, absent a political intervention from the Europgroup or the IMF.

Re: Greece debt crisis: ECB 'to end' bank emergency lending

#23

Post by johansch » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 12:02 PM UTC

jkot wrote: post #7

imaginenore wrote: post #3

It's about time. Greece has been behaving like a gambling addict, asking for money to repay the old debts only to waste them in expensive restaurants, buying iPhones, and gambling even more.

Not really. Most people I know have long hours and work their arses of. Taxi driver usually works 12 hours / 6 days a week for 20 euro a day net profit. Security guy takes about 500 euro a month for similar hours. It is about pensioners and state employees.

I agree, I found the greek taxi drivers quite diligent in ripping me off when I was there last time.

Re: Greece debt crisis: ECB 'to end' bank emergency lending

#24

Post by chkuendig » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 12:03 PM UTC

elmar wrote: post #19

They have to impose capital restrictions fast... What Would Greek Capital Controls Look Like? http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-06-01/how-greek-...

Varoufakis apparently told BBC that the banks might stay closed tomorrow and that capital controls could be imposed.

http://twitter.com/suttonnick/status/615112479828348928

edit: scratch that. http://twitter.com/yanisvaroufakis/status/615127339102531584

Re: Greece debt crisis: ECB 'to end' bank emergency lending

#25

Post by aikah » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 12:04 PM UTC

imaginenore wrote: post #3

It's about time. Greece has been behaving like a gambling addict, asking for money to repay the old debts only to waste them in expensive restaurants, buying iPhones, and gambling even more.

> It's about time. Greece has been behaving like a gambling addict, asking for money to repay the old debts only to waste them in expensive restaurants, buying iPhones, and gambling even more.

You have a limited understanding of the situation. And you don't need to be that insulting toward Greece.

I know here it is apparently ok to make fun of people in a dare situation and talk about them like they are fool and idiots yet in that case the responsibility is shared across many parties and the EU itself has a huge responsibility in that fiasco.

What the point saying what you just said? does it make you feel smarter or like you belong to a superior class? Would you want others to talk about you or your country that way when things turn south? no, so have a little respect. We are talking about people here who are mostly victims. Or do you think people here will laught at your speech because that's what they do in real life when you say horrible things?

Re: Greece debt crisis: ECB 'to end' bank emergency lending

#26

Post by icebraining » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 12:04 PM UTC

randomname2 wrote: post #13

The BBC should know better than this, using "unnamed sources" to quote a rumour as fact. No decision has been made yet, so this is just misinformation. Expect more of this over the next days.

Reminds me of Yes, Minister:

  - Can I attribute it? "Minister speaks out"?
  - No, no, no.
  - Then, where did I get the story? I can't say, "Officially announced."
  - "Government spokesman"?
  - How about, "Sources close to Minister"?
  - Hold on, I don't want everybody to know I told you! Couldn't you do,
    "Speculation is growing in Westminster"?
  - A bit weak.
  - "Unofficial spokesman"?
  - Used that twice this week already!
  - The Cabinet's leaking like a sieve, isn't it?

Re: Greece debt crisis: ECB 'to end' bank emergency lending

#27

Post by jmedwards » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 12:05 PM UTC

jkot wrote: post #7

imaginenore wrote: post #3

It's about time. Greece has been behaving like a gambling addict, asking for money to repay the old debts only to waste them in expensive restaurants, buying iPhones, and gambling even more.

Not really. Most people I know have long hours and work their arses of. Taxi driver usually works 12 hours / 6 days a week for 20 euro a day net profit. Security guy takes about 500 euro a month for similar hours. It is about pensioners and state employees.

I think it is unfair and lazy to characterise a people that way.

There is, however, deep structural or cultural issues that causes Greece to have such a massive tax gap: http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/scr/2013/cr13155.pdf.

People may well be working hard, but a significant enough number of people are not contributing enough to the state, yet are demanding (by voting) ever more from it, and leaders seemed to have always been relaxed about it (I can't find the source again, but I remember reading that there is even a significant tax cap in the civil service itself).

Re: Greece debt crisis: ECB 'to end' bank emergency lending

#28

Post by jkot » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 12:07 PM UTC

lmb wrote: post #17

jkot wrote: post #5

There were similar leaks from ECB to force Irish to take bailout. Anyway we will see on monday, right now some ATMs in athens are still working.

Since this is [citation needed] I dug around. Seems like yes, the ECB pressured Ireland into accepting a bailout by threatening them to shut down ELA. But in fact they did it in a secret letter from Trichet to the then finance minister. Getting that letter released took some pressure, as well. [0][1] So, the only similarity seems to be the ECB threatening to pull ELA. There has alreay been debate that the ECB is alre…

My source is former Irish financial minister talking at parliamentary commission, which investigated crisis, a few months ago. Dont really remember details.

Re: Greece debt crisis: ECB 'to end' bank emergency lending

#29

Post by peteretep » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 12:07 PM UTC

randomname2 wrote: post #13

The BBC should know better than this, using "unnamed sources" to quote a rumour as fact. No decision has been made yet, so this is just misinformation. Expect more of this over the next days.

    > "unnamed sources"

This doesn't mean it was a friend's uncle's brother told them, it means someone in a position to know intentionally leaked it.

Re: Greece debt crisis: ECB 'to end' bank emergency lending

#30

Post by raesene9 » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 12:08 PM UTC

randomname2 wrote: post #13

The BBC should know better than this, using "unnamed sources" to quote a rumour as fact. No decision has been made yet, so this is just misinformation. Expect more of this over the next days.

Unfortunately this is extremely common in many countries where politicians and civil servants want something out without having it tied to them.

If you've been following the greece coverage, there's been lots of documents leaking from various sources on both sides of the negotiations. Last week when the initial greek proposal and the IMF "red-lined" version were in discussion, both were leaked on the day...