European sovereign debt crisis timeline

Greece's creditors urged Athens on Wednesday to speed up the agreed reforms, otherwise it may miss out on measures adding up to 1 billion euros. Meanwhile, experts told Xinhua it is unlikely that pressure on Greece will increase this year.

Greece is at risk of missing a first tranche of ECB profit returns on Greek bond holdings due to delays in the pace of privatisations despite over-performance on its fiscal targets, sources told Reuters on Tuesday.

Ten European Union finance ministers want any unsustainable public debt in the eurozone to undergo restructuring, with losses imposed on the private sector, before a public bailout is organized, a joint position paper by the 10 ministers said.

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.

Credit ratings agency Fitch on Aug. 10 upgraded Greece's sovereign debt one notch to 'BB-' from 'B' due to the recent deal with Europe to provide "substantial" debt relief.

Global rating agency Fitch Ratings upgraded the long-term foreign currency issuer default rating on Greece to 'BB-' from 'B'.

The outlook on Greece is stable, Fitch said on Friday.

Greece's banking sector is getting better, Fitch noted, adding that the country's relationship with its European creditors has "substantially improved".

The Greek government will have to complete all prior actions of its third program by June 14, so that eurozone finance ministers will be able to approve on June 21 the disbursement of Greece's loan installment and make decisions on the country's debt and post-bailout supervision, according to a European official in Brussels on Friday.

Moody's ratings agency upgraded Greece's credit rating by two notches late on Wednesday to B3, saying the country is set to return to market-based funding following the conclusion of its current bailout program in the summer.

The differences between the eurozone and the International Monetary Fund regarding the easing of the Greek debt have again been exposed in the last few days, while offering an outlook of what the next few months will be like in terms of negotiations.

Greece's 10-year borrowing costs dropped to an eight-year low with a trader citing an upbeat announcement from eurozone bailout fund European Stability Mechanism earlier this week.

The yield on Greece's 10-year government bond has dropped to an eight-year low of around 4.84 percent.

[Reuters]