Varoufakis counts on Draghi to avoid Greek default in March

By Nikos Chrysoloras & Erik Schatzker

Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis said he's counting on the European Central Bank to help the country avert default when it runs out of money next month, while bank deposits are also starting to flow back.

The ECB owes Greece almost 2 billion euros ($2.3 billion) from the return of profits from its program of buying euro- region bonds to support the market, Varoufakis said in an interview with Bloomberg Television in Athens. The government must make a payment to the International Monetary Fund in March.

"So it could hand over this money to the IMF as partial repayment," he said on Wednesday. "I'm giving you examples, nothing has been decided. This is money we are owed. This is our money, an overpayment to the ECB."

ECB President Mario Draghi told the European Parliament on Wednesday it's a popular misconception that it's up to his institution to return any profit from the Securities Markets Program. He said governments are in control of the funds.

"You still believe that the SMP profits are owned by the ECB and are kept there? That's not so," he said. "The SMP profit, like any other profit, has been distributed to all the central-bank members of the ECB. And the central-bank members of the ECB have transferred their profits to their national budgets."

Deposits return

Euro-area governments agreed in November 2012 to transfer to Greece an amount equal to any profit on SMP holdings of the country's debt as long as it complies with the conditions of its surveillance program.

The region's finance ministers on Tuesday approved a package of Greek reforms, which include improved tax collection and tackling corruption, following a recommendation from...