Eurozone

European Central Bank (ECB) Executive Board member Benoit Coeure told the influential daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung that the ECB rejects the Greek government's recent request to issue more short-term debt (via T-bills) because this would be tantamount to illegally financing Greece.

One of the proposals in the letter sent by Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis to Greece's international creditors was the use of students, housekeepers, and even tourists to serve as undercover tax inspectors. He said that they could be paid an hourly rate "on a strictly short-term, casual basis" for no more than two months.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has accused the European Central Bank of holding "a rope" around the country's neck as Athens scrambled on March 6 to avert a looming state default.
      
The ECB "is still holding the rope which we have around our necks," said Tsipras, according to excerpts of an interview with Germany magazine Der Spiegel to appear Saturday.
      

Greece will auction 1 billion euros of three-month treasury bills on March 11 to refinance a maturing issue, debt agency PDMA said on Friday, announcing its second sale this month as the government faces a cash crunch.

Greece repaid on Friday the first installment worth EUR 310 M of the IMF loan, which is due until the end of March.

In total, Greece has to repay EUR 1.5 B to IMF during the next two weeks, daily Kathimerini reports.

Although the government of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras had promised to repay the loan, the country faces a difficult cash position.

Berlin does not see any basis for Greece to get the next tranche of its bailout immediately to prevent it from becoming insolvent but if Athens implements its reforms sooner than expected, it could get paid early, a German finance ministry spokesman said.

Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis on Friday sent a new letter to the Eurogroup essentially fleshing out the six reform proposals that Greece is expected to present at Monday's meeting of eurozone finance ministers, sources in Brussels indicated.

Fitch rating agency released a statement of Friday according to which Greece's exit from the eurozone is still possible. However, this development is unlikely to cause a systemic crisis like the one in 2012, Fitch notes.

Greece needs to pay back all the money it received from its euro zone partners rather than asking for debt relief, the head of the euro zone's rescue fund was quoted as saying on Friday.

Bank of Greece Governor Yannis Stournaras visited Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras on Friday to brief him on discussions at the meeting of the European Central Bank's governing council in Nicosia and on decisions relating to Greece taken there.