Greek withdrawal from the eurozone

Several years ago, in the midst of the Grexit crisis, I asked a friend how to say "virtuous circle" in Greek. He said the expression didn't exist; there was only a term for "vicious circle". My friend was wrong. There is a Greek expression for virtuous circle - and the country may finally be about to enter one with this Sunday's general election.

A top-secret Grexit plan designed by the ECB, the EU and its financial mechanisms has been detailed in a new book entitled The Last Bluff and authored by Eleni Varvitsiots, the Brussels correspondent of the Athens daily Kathimerini Eleni Varvitsioti and Bloomberg's Viktoria Dendrinou.

Following leftist SYRIZA's stinging defeat to conservative New Democracy in European Parliament elections, the columnist for The Times Simon Nixon commented that Greece was on the brink of electing a "pro-European mainstream center-right government.

Eurozone officials showed concern after Athens announced plans to cut taxes and raise welfare spending which could breach commitments made by Greece to its creditors, three sources involved in monitoring the country's fiscal situation said.

Tsipras has told his EU counterparts that if a Brexit deal is not concluded before the European Parliament elections in May then the UK will have to hold EU elections as well, an eventuality that would deal a severe blow to Brexiteers and leave room for scrapping Brexit altogether.

When Deputy Labour Minister Tasos Petropoulos announced the prospect of handing out an Easter bonus to pensioners and civil servants (holiday bonuses were abolished by the bailout memorandums), Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos to hastened to nip the idea in the bud.

Former German finance minister Wolfgang Schaeuble, widely regarded as the architect of austerity in eurozone crisis countries, said in an interview in the Financial Times on Friday that Greece should have taken a 10-year timeout from the bloc.

Greece sold treasury bills worth 812.5 million euros on Wednesday, according to a Public Debt Management Agency (PDMA) announcement.
The 52-week treasury bills were sold at a 0.95 percent yield, down from 1.09 percent at the previous similar auction conducted on December 12, 2018, according to the e-mailed PDMA press release.

Greece needs to press ahead with unfinished economic reforms to cut risks to its recovery in the medium term, the International Monetary Fund said on Tuesday in its first report since the country exited its third bailout.

"Only 9 per cent of Leavers would mind if a relative married a strong Remainer. But 37 per cent of Remainers would mind if a relative married a strong Leaver."

In both referendums, the vote was a very personal thing. In Britain, your friend's or relative's choice might threaten your status in the country. In Greece, it could decide whether you could access your savings account.