Phone conference tomorrow on the guarantees

Tomorrow, Eurozone Finance ministry members are to have a phone conference to discuss the collateral that Finland is asking Greece for in order to help the country in the bailout package, says a Financial Times report.

According to it, after Moody's announcement last week which said the agreement between Finland and Greece concerning the guarantees might be delayed and doubted the realization of the future bailout plans, now more market officials are sending the same warning messages.

Today, the Finnish FinMin Jutta Urpilainen said her country’s stance on the matter remains unchanged, underlining that the Finnish objectives “should not be a surprise” to the rest of the Eurozone members since they had been included in the agendas of two EU summits.

Experts believe that most probably, Finland will pull out from the second 109-billion-euro bailout package. If this happens, then Greece will have to deal with the bad omens already "in the air”, as more will be the countries which, in order to give Greeks a hand, will ask for collateral. Thus, it will be proven from inside the eurozone that its main leaders are unable to handle this crisis.

Moreover, companies in the financial field such as Barclays Capital find that the way Finland insists on guarantees is blocking the arteries of the rest of the system, as the Greek bond sale and exchange will take longer that estimated.  The company underlines that this kind of persistent behaviour could even cause political turmoil among EU leaders. 

On the other hand, Capital Economics does not foresee serious complications in the very near future.

Extra-ordinary meeting in Brussels

The situation and the climate in the Eurozone will be the main topic on the agenda of the extra-ordinary meeting of the financial committee of the European Council in Brussels on August 29, as was announced earlier today by the press office of the European Parliament.

During their Brussels meeting, the ECB and Eurogroup heads, Jean-Claude Trichet and Jean-Claude Juncker respectively, will have the chance to discuss the latest developments as well as the next necessary steps. Other high ranking officials to participate in the meeting will be EU Commissioner for Finance Olli Rehn and the president of the Ecofin, Polish FinMin Jacek Rostowski.