MADRID | By Julia Pastor | France just started to go through its new year’s checklist. President Hollande announced last week budgetary cuts of €50 billion for 2015-2017, in addition to those €15bn revealed in September. The country urgently needs to increase revenues and it could do it via the sale of state-owned companies stakes such as a French and European reference like Airbus.
MADRID | By JP Marin Arrese | In the aftermath of the last minute deal brokered in Congress to avoid a devastating US default, Obama warned against turning disagreement into highly disruptive “dysfunctionality”. A rather mild way to portray the utter economic wreckage any further delay in solving the debt ceiling deadlock would have prompted. Faced with a similar challenge in a couple of months, he chose to play down the reckless Republican attitude in the House, praising instead the bipartisan efforts to prevent the worst from happening.
LONDON | By BARCLAYS | The Portuguese government presented yesterday the draft Budget Law for 2014. Fiscal measures to be deployed amount to EUR3.9bn (2.4% of GDP), about 0.4% of GDP above the EUR3.3bn announced in May when the cabinet approved additional austerity measures to meet revised fiscal targets for this year and next (EUR1.4bn in 2013 and EUR3.3bn in 2014).
THE CORNER | ECB executive board member Jorg Asmussen has said there are “pending risks” for Ireland as it prepares to exit the EU-IMF 85 billion euro bailout on December 15. Dublin is launching its seventh austerity budget in six years on Tuesday, under pressure to deliver a €2.5 billion package of more cuts and taxes without compromising the fragile recovery. Investors are watching closely.
BRUSSELS | by Eberhard Rhein | However important balanced budgets might be for Europe in view of its rising social charges, in particular the huge burden resulting from an ageing population, Germany does not deserve praise for having precipitated the balancing of its budget.
MADRID | The most effective cuts were delivered by sheer lack of money as regional and local authorities faced a disruptive lock-out in the credit market.
free advice on getting your ex girlfriend back NEW YORK | California's new fiscal year begins July 1 with a massive problem: a $16 billion hole, the biggest deficit of the 50 states. Without one budget in place, the Golden State would not be able to make certain payments to schools or pay salaries of officials and their staff. While part of Europe suffers from austerity, California's lawmakers are also…
VALENCIAPLAZA.COM | Víctor Alvargonzález is executive director at financial advisor firm Profim. Alvargonzález points at the root of all Bankia’s problems: in his opinion, a bank managed was destined to become a systemic disaster waiting to happen. He believes Spain’s finances hurt more from lack of credibility than soundness, though. Is it time to avoid the Ibex for a while? We have been sort of avoiding the Spanish market for over…
Universities in the US have acknowledged that they distort the employment figures of their graduates. Now, some newly graduated lawyers have begun litigation against them because, in spite of official assurances, they have been left jobless. WASHINGTON | Some U.S. lawyers have decided to file lawsuits against their Law schools. The reason? They were promised a job upon graduation but have been given none after four years of studies in addition to…
MADRID | Barclays Capital made a realistic yet not Armageddon-like exercise in which the Spanish banking sector would need a recapitalisation equivalent to 6 percent of the country’s GDP, plus an additional 5.4 percent of GDP as an extra-safety calculation. Its analysts threw in 0.9 percent of GDP in Greek liabilities, and 3.5 percent of GDP in administrations’ accumulated debt payments. The scenario considered included yields on 10-year bonds of…