Greece still in hot water despite European rescue plan, painful austerity

Press quote (Canadian Business.com)
Philip Whyte
07 April 2010

Philip Whyte at the Centre for European Reform think tank, said the pressure is on European leaders to produce "a proper rescue package" similar to backing for European banks that ended a 2008 market panic... "Frankly the agreement that they came up with a couple of weeks ago was smoke and mirrors ... it wasn't a real agreement," Whyte said. "If yields remain at 7 per cent plus, given the amount of debt that Greece needs to roll over this year, we could well see a default within the eurozone," Whyte said. "Greece is the first in a series of dominos and unless the euro area comes up with a credible package that gets it out of the mess that it is currently in, markets could quickly turn their attention to countries like Spain."