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Thursday, June 18, 2015

The Eurogroup just finished with no deal for Greece (GREK)

The meeting Eurogroup finance ministers finished up early Thursday evening with no deal for Athens. In less than two weeks, Greece owes €1.5 billion ($1.70 billion or £1.08 billion) to the IMF that the government almost certainly doesn't have. Ahead of this meeting, both Greece and its European creditors had circled it as the time for a deal to be reached before anything goes seriously wrong in Greece.  And as of Thursday, it looks like a deal is still out of reach. According to headlines from Reuters, there is now a summit of euro-area leaders scheduled for Monday.  In a press conference following Thursday's meeting, Eurogroup president Jeroen Dijsselbloem said that "no agreement yet is in sight" between Greece and its European creditors.  Dijsselbloem added that the ball is "clearly in the Greek court," and that a deal must be "credible" from the point of view of Greece and the European Union as a whole. Dijsselbloem added that given the current state of negotiations, it would be "unthinkable" for Greece to receive aid by June 30.  IMF president Christine Lagarde added simply, "We are waiting." Lagarde said the proposals put to Greece were easier than they had been previously and said this process cannot be about "smoke and mirrors," reiterating that anything offered by Greece must be credible. Lagarde later added, in response to a question, that a dialogue on Greece can only proceed with "adults in the room." Though almost everyone went into today's meeting insisting that a deal was very unlikely, markets spiked and slumped on reports coming out of the summit.  Germany's Die Zeit reported an offer originally — saying that the European Commission and European Central Bank would sign off on shifting €10 billion (£7.18 billion, $11.40 billion) earmarked for bank recapitalisation to the government to use for everyday spending, while Athens would be allowed to issue another €2 billion (£1.44 billion, $2.28 billion) in bonds, which would be bought by Greece's banks.  EU Commission vice president Valdis Dombrovskis quickly poured cold water on this report, however, saying that no deal was struck. According to Politico's Ryan Heath, Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis presented five pages of proposals to the group — that could be a positive thing, with new ideas, or it could be simply a restatement of what's already gone.  The uncertainty is causing some pretty choppy movements in the euro-dollar exchange rate, which had been basically stable through the day:  Join the conversation about this story » NOW WATCH: Forget the Apple Watch — here's the new watch everyone on Wall Street wants


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