Source: fortune.com - Monday, January 26, 2015 Markets are taking the landslide election in Greece more or less in stride. Greek stocks fell on the news that the anti-austerity Syriza party will take power. But European stocks and the Euro seemed to be largely unaffected by the news, despite the fact that Syriza vows to fight the Troika of the European Commission, the IMF, and the European Central bank and force them to forgive some Greek debt and allow the country to enact a program of stimulus spending, among other reforms. Markets are shrugging off the news because they still view the chances of Greece leaving the Euro as remote. “The new government will find that the Troika plans to play hardball,” says Tom Elliott, International Investment Strategist at deVere Group. Elliott argues that Greece has little leverage in its negotiations with its debt holders. It has a EUR4.5 billion bond maturing in March and two similarly large payments due in July and August, which it won’t be able to pay without aid from Europe. While its debt holders might be willing to extend the maturity on these debts or lower interest rates, the Troika won’t budge on debt forgiveness out of fear that it would encourage other debtor nations to ask for similar concessions. The only leverage Greece has is to threaten to exit the euro, an act that would surely cause a banking crisis and a severe recession--at least in the short term--in Greece without doing much broader damage to the eurozone economy. ThAll Related | More on Greece
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