Anfa

The European Commission will ask eurozone finance ministers to approve the disbursement of 748 million euros in SMP and ANFA profits that European central banks made when buying Greek sovereign bonds, according to the sixth enhanced surveillance report by the European Union's executive arm.

The European Commission has improved - albeit marginally - its estimate on Greek growth this year to 2.4 percent in its Winter 2020 Economic Forecast, against 2.3 percent in its fall outlook. However, this figure continues to lag the government estimate of 2.8 percent and is much closer to that of the Bank of Greece (2.5 percent).

The European Commission is reportedly looking for ways to include returns from European central banks' profits from Greek bonds they bought through the Securities Market Program (SMP) and the Agreement on Net Financial Assets (ANFA) as budget revenue.

Representatives of the eurozone's finance ministers are expected in their next meeting on Thursday to prepare the ground so that profits made on the country's bonds by the European Central Bank (ECB) and euro area central banks during the economic crisis can be transferred to Greece, according to sources.

By Sotiris Nikas

The disbursement to Greece of 2.1 billion euros from the profits of the Eurosystem from Greek SMP and ANFA bonds has hit a stumbling block due to timetable changes and different interpretations of existing agreements.