By Peter Spiegel and Quentin Peel in Brussels
Yields on peripheral European government debt rallied sharply on news that French president Nicolas Sarkozy had agreed to drop a plan to help fund a €115bn Greek bail-out with a €50bn ($71bn) bank tax. The move marks a significant victory for Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, who extracted the concession at a late night meeting in Berlin on Wednesday ahead of an emergency summit of eurozone leaders.
The tax plan, which would have raised €10bn a year for five years through a 0.0025 per cent levy on all assets held by eurozone banks, was strongly resisted by Berlin, which saw the plan as taking too long to implement and raise funds which would have been used for a massive Greek bond repurchase programme.
The tax plan, which would have raised €10bn a year for five years through a 0.0025 per cent levy on all assets held by eurozone banks, was strongly resisted by Berlin, which saw the plan as taking too long to implement and raise funds which would have been used for a massive Greek bond repurchase programme.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Everyone is encouraged to participate with civilized comments.