All the latest economic and financial news, including developments around Greece’s increasingly fraught bailout talksLatest: Greece reshuffles negotiating teamGreek opposition call for Yanis Varoufakis to quit......but insiders say he still has Tsipras’s supportIntroduction: Another week of Greek drama aheadFT: Varoufakis being sidelinedGreek bonds weaken after Eurogroup deadlock 12.04pm BST With or without Yanis at the wheel, it will be hard for Greece’s government to agree a reform programme that is acceptable to both its lenders and its own left-wing MPs.#Greece Τsakalotos taking the lead & #Varoufakis getting sidelined might soothe creditors, but doesn't necessarily soothe #Syriza's stance. 11.57am BST Germany’s Bild tabloid is reporting that Greece is planning to present a new list of reforms to creditors on Wednesday.It includes abandoning plans to raise the minimum wage.Bild kicking off the rumor mill. Says Greece has revised reform list, ready to suspend minimum-wage plans.Getting there, slowly but surely: - reschuffling of Greek negotiation team - revised reform list, including minimum wage (Bild) 11.45am BST Italy’s economy minister, Pier Carlo Padoan, has denied that the eurozone is now secretly planning for life without Greece.Padoan told reporters in Rome:“As far as I’m aware, there is no Plan B on Greece...The aim is to get a rapid accord with Athens.” 11.22am BST Reuters has also been told that Yanis Varoufakis still enjoys the support of PM Tsipras (as flagged earlier)But despite these signals, Greek negotiating team is being shaken up - giving more responsibility to Euclid Tsakalotos, the government’s chief economics spokesman.Tsipras, in a meeting on Sunday with senior aides and ministers including the deputy prime minister and economy minister, expressed support for Varoufakis and agreed the finance minister will supervise a new group to lead “political talks” with lenders.However, deputy Foreign Minister Euclid Tsakalotos will be tasked with coordinating the group, the official said, suggesting the Oxford-educated economist and professor would have a more active role in talks with the EU and IMF. 11.01am BST #Greece | Varoufakis confidant Nikos Theocarakis replaced in Brussels Group with Nikos Houliarakis. A sign of Varoufakis retreat. 11.00am BST Reports are coming in that Greece’s negotiating team is being shaken up:New political negotiation group for #Greece under the supervision of the greek finmin @yanisvaroufakisGreek gov't says FinMin Varoufakis to form "political negotiation team" that will be led by Alt Foreign Minister Euclid Tsakalotos #GreeceDespite govt officials backing @yanisvaroufakis, others are being introduced/upgraded in talks process #Greece 10.59am BST #Greek govt officials spreading the message that @yanisvaroufakis has the full backing of govt https://t.co/XgR4nr75Dd 10.44am BST Over in Athens calls are growing for the Greek finance minister’s head, after he came away from last Friday’s eurogroup with criticism ringing in his ears, and no signs of progress with creditors.“He has to resign today to make things easier for Mr Tsipras and to liberate him so that it doesn’t seem that he is being sacked on the orders of people abroad.” “I am not at all sure that Mr Varoufakis has not adopted the logic of the drachma....Mr Varoufakis is an impediment for Greece.”“Mr Varoufakis will be alright, he will be able to go on and lecture in universities but does he think of ordinary Greeks who do not have such possibilities?”. 10.29am BST 10.26am BST Breaking away from Greece for a moment; Japan has just been hit with a credit rating downgrade.Fitch cut Japan’s rating by one notch, from A+ to A; the sixth-highest credit rating available. It blamed the cut on Tokyo’s failure to agree “sufficient structural fiscal measures” in its most recent budget, to make up for delaying a sales tax rise.Japan’s main sovereign credit and rating weakness is the high and rising level of government debt. Fitch projects the gross general government (GG) debt to GDP ratio to rise to 244% of GDP by end-2015, by far the highest ratio of any rated sovereign. 10.11am BST Jeroen Dijsselbloem has also confirmed that he spoke with Greek PM Tsipras after Friday’s Eurogroup dramas in Riga. Asked by De Volkskrant whether Yanis Varoufakis was the right man to handle the negotiations, Dijsselbloem replied that the issues go beyond Varoufakis’s remit: Yes, it is about the budget and the financial sector but also on privatization, labor market and pensions. So much more than the portfolio of the Minister of Finance.....In @marcpeeperkorn intvw, @J_Dijsselbloem confirms he called @atsipras after Friday's #eurogroup bust-up in #Riga: http://t.co/fRbmSd9gBR 10.00am BST Is Yanis Varougakis being painted as the fall guy by eurozone members who have lost patience with Greece?Alastair Winter, chief economist at investment bank Daniel Stewart’s, suspects so. He writes: It appears that Mr Varoufakis, a renowned exponent of game theory, may have mistaken the game that the Northerners are playing. Encouraged by Messrs Juncker, Draghi, Moscovici and Ms Lagarde, he is playing the game to avoid Grexit. In his post-meeting interviews he said “Any mention of a plan B is profoundly anti-European, My immediate response was to say there is no such plan B, there cannot be such a plan B.” However, the Northerners’ game seems more like avoiding getting the blame for Grexit even if they cannot yet agree a Plan B (because of opposition from those encouraging Mr Varoufakis). The Greeks are still holding out for the last €7.2bn tranche from the second bail-out, no more supervision by the lenders and release from most if not all current budgetary and structural reform targets. Once that is out the way, they then will want to talk about a third bail-out.Wonder if circumventing Varoufakis just another instalment in Northerners trying to escape blame for Grexit while Greece trying to avoid it? 9.49am BST Good news for readers whose grasp of Greek is as poor as mine; Enikos will translating Alexis Tsipras’s interview tonight into English (from 9.30pm UK time, I think)@graemewearden Simultaneous translation into English for Alexis #Tsipras first live interview -http://t.co/0PrAT10q83 9.42am BST Eurogroup chief Jeroen Dijsselbloem has told Dutch newspaper De Volkskrant that Greece will not require a “great” new bailout when its existing programme expires.I’m not going to speculate on the extent, but the amounts are of an entirely different order than the current help.Dijsselbloem statement is interesting. No 3rd major program for #Greece could mean two things: i) Greece gets dumped ii) debt rescheduling 9.28am BST I forgot to mention this earlier, but Alexis Tsipras is giving a live TV interview late tonight, to discuss the debt crisis.Mr. Tsipras will answer questions from leading journalist Nikos Chatzinikolaou and an invited audience on all the critical issues facing Greece and the negotiations with its lenders. 9.22am BST Greek bonds are weakening this morning, pushing up yields further into the danger zone.The yields on Greece’s two-year bond has jumped to 26.8%, up from 26% on Friday night, showing a higher risk of default.Peripheral spreads widen as markets prepare for Greek endgame. #Grexit pic.twitter.com/bnCq2fzmWa 9.10am BST Yanis Varoufakis is making headlines today, but not in the way he’d like:Everything going well then pic.twitter.com/qA5uzhI7Wc 8.46am BST Greek worries are pushing Europe’s stock markets down in early trading, with France’s CAC index losing 1%:Proposals from Greece do not include important issues such as pension cuts and labour market reforms and are not something the creditors will be able to stomach.” 8.36am BST Lots of chatter about Greece this morning:#EU hopes to sideline #Greece finance minister and deal directly with PM. Little progress made on bailout, some big repayments due in weeksGreece to find ways to assemble enough cash to pay pensioners and employees, after euro ministers say no more aid until bailout terms met#Greece | Brussels Group to hold conference call later today in a revived effort to bridge gap in Greek bailout talks. 8.33am BST A German government spokesman has confirmed reports that chancellor Merkel spoke with the Greek prime minister by phone yesterday.“expressed their common will for a steady communication throughout the course of negotiations in order to have a mutually beneficial solution soon” 8.21am BST The Financial Times is also reporting that Yanis Varoufakis is being sidelined, after last Friday’s “highly critical” eurogroup meeting: Greece’s dire financial position is forcing eurozone authorities to look beyond Mr Varoufakis to Alexis Tsipras, prime minister, much like in February when Jeroen Dijsselbloem, the Dutch finance minister who chairs the eurogroup, brokered an extension of the current bailout programme.According to two eurozone officials, Mr Dijsselbloem phoned Mr Tsipras from Riga in an effort to mend fences after Friday’s feisty eurogroup meeting, where Mr Varoufakis was rounded on by his eurozone colleagues. 8.18am BST Good morning, and welcome to our rolling coverage of events around the world economy, the financial markets, the eurozone and business.It looks like another week dominated by Greece’s debt crisis.“He is completely isolated,” a senior euro zone official told Reuters on condition of anonymity.“He didn’t even come to the dinner to represent his country,” the official said of the event where ministers, serenaded by a Latvian choir, ate salmon and sea bass.FDR, 1936: "They are unanimous in their hate for me; and I welcome their hatred." A quotation close to my heart (& reality) these days Related: Greek finance minister hints at strained EU relations: 'I welcome their hatred' Greece has moved somewhat closer to a technical default after the weekend’s antics, although it seems the majority of Europe’s finance ministers have had about as much as they can take of the Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis and will look to deal directly with top dog Alexis Tsipras from here on in. Continue reading...
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