Greek bailout wards off disaster – for now

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A second, 130 billion euro ($A160 billion) bailout and a deep debt write-off for financially stricken Greece will ward off a financial disaster in Europe.

Economists, however, only give the deal a slim chance of putting the country on the path to economic recovery – and steadying its place in Europe’s currency union.

Agreement on the bailout, reached early on Tuesday after an all-night summit of finance ministers seven months after it was first proposed, will give Greece 130 billion euro in loans through 2014 from other eurozone governments and the International Monetary Fund.

It’s the country’s second bailout, following a 110 billion euro rescue secured in 2010 that didn’t return the country to solvency.

The agreement also assumes that banks and investors owed money by Greece will take new bonds that reduce their holdings by more than half.

In return for the second bailout, Greece has agreed to painful and humiliating measures imposed by its mistrustful partners which also use the euro, annoyed after two years of what they say are broken promises to reform.

Athens agreed to cut spending and wages, and to permit outsiders to supervise its finances through the presence of European Union and International Monetary Fund officials permanently stationed in Greece.

The rescuers also demanded a separate account for the aid money and legal guarantees that creditors get paid before teachers, doctors and police do.

The finance ministers from Greece and the other 16 countries that use the euro wrangled until the early morning over the details of the rescue, squeezing last-minute concessions out of private holders of Greek debt who agreed to lose 53.5 per cent of the face value of their investment to avoid even more severe losses expected if Greece fails to pay 14.5 billion euro in debt coming due March 20.

The fear is that an uncontrolled bankruptcy could unleash market panic across the rest of the continent, further unsettling other struggling other debt-stricken countries such as Ireland, Portugal or the much bigger Italy or Spain.