Economy of Greece

The Telegraph reported last week over one ground-breaking program in London aimed at pinpointing, promoting and implementing a start-up idea to immediately boost the crisis-plagued Greek economy.

Six short-listed companies worked with corporate mentors, including Google executive Steve Vranakis and George Kartakis of Paypal-owned Braintree, according to the newspaper.

Reuters news agency quotes a European Commission official as saying that if Athens implements the necessary reforms within the next two months, then the Eurozone would be willing to make some concessions on the Greek debt. According to Reuters, the Eurozone government would discuss servicing up to 15% of the Greek debt to GDP.

Equity prices dropped at the Athens Stock Exchange at 11 a.m. on Monday with the basic share price index down 0.41% at 671.05 points and turnover at 1.58 million euros.

The FTSE/ASE Large Cap index for blue chip and heavily traded stocks was down 0.21% and the FTSE/ASE Mid Cap index was down 0.54%.

The Standard & Poor’s agency on Friday reaffirmed Greece’s sovereign rating at CCC+ with a stable outlook. S&P also predicted that the country’s economy will shrink by 3 percent in 2015.

Finance Minister Nikos Christodoulakis invited the business world to participate actively in the country’s effort to complete investments totaling up to 100 billion euros by 2020, speaking at a debate organized by the Athens Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Greek business federation SEV .

Caretaker Greek Finance Minister Giorgos Chouliarakis completely ruled out the possibility of a bail-in on Greek deposits, speaking in London. The interim Minister set 4 major goals for the Greek economy during his road-show in London before foreign investors.

Equity prices on Tuesday rose on the Athens Stock Exchange (ASE) as the basic share price index went up 0.67% at 659.74 points at 11 a.m. with a turnover at 3.12 million euros.

The Hellenic Statistical Authority (EL.STAT) released a report showing a 63.1% fall in Greece’s trade deficit, as the both exports and imports recorded a drop in July. More specifically, the total revenue of imports stood at just over 3bln Euros, compared to 4.5bln in July 2014, a 32% reduction.

Feeling unable to see their future in Greece, many companies move to the country's northern neighbor, Bulgaria, a German daily suggests.

With the Greek economy having hit rock bottom, more than ten thousand businesses have chosen to move in Bulgaria over the past few years, according to Dear Tagesspiegel.