Driller - QE, EU bail-outs of Italian banks.......I cannot remember the original argument....but it was along the lines of you saying that the EU HADN'T bailed them out?
OK here goes......an article from Forbes dated June 2017 entitled "Italy's Latest Bank Bail-Out"
Extract:
Italy has finally gotten around to sorting out its banks. But the way it is going about it looks horribly familiar. Never mind the EU’s high-minded ideas about bailing in creditors. In Italy, they like to do things the traditional way. Bailouts are back.
in December 2016, the Italian government approved a 20bn euro bailout fund. Italy would have to borrow this money, of course. But no matter, Italy has borrowed so much already that a bit more won’t make much difference. And anyway, the ECB has its back. Italian government bonds are included in the ECB’s QE program, which effectively caps their yields. A Greek-style bond crisis would be all but impossible.
The Italian government decided that although these banks might not be systemically important to the EU, they most certainly are to Italy. Claiming that allowing them to fail would cause disruption to the local economy in Venice, it bailed them out.
The bailout is dressed up as a rescue by a larger bank along the same lines as Santander’s recent acquisition for a nominal 1 euro of the insolvent Spanish lender Banco Popular.
Italy's decision, supported by the European Commission, tramples the BRRD to death. Senior creditors need never again fear losses due to a failing bank. If it is systemically important, it will be given a precautionary recapitalization at taxpayers’ expense. If it is not, an excuse will be found to bail it out at taxpayers’ expense. Either way, seniors and unsecured depositors are safe.
That is, they are as safe as politicians want them to be. Italy is able to bail out these banks – and will no doubt in due course bail out others too – because it is a big country which can easily borrow the funds needed. It has decided to do so principally because its politicians fear for their jobs if the Venetian economy tanks and small bondholders lose their savings. And the European Commission has supported its decision principally because Italy is much too big to bully.
The long-running standoff between the EU and Italy over bank resolution has ended with the EU caving in.
We now have a two-speed Eurozone, made up of big countries that can do what they like, and small ones that must obey the rules set by the big ones. Not that there is anything new about this. We are simply back to where we were in the good old days, when Germany and France could break Eurozone rules with impunity but woe betide a smaller country that tried to do so. Italy, too, is part of the “too big to bully” club. Bankers, you know what to do.
Full article.....
https://www.forbes.com/sites/frances.../#516a1e8315ef
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Originally Posted by tarquinbeech
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