After coming to an understanding on Thursday evening, Greece and Europe are expected to come to an agreement at the Eurogroup meeting scheduled for Monday, the 16th of February.
The Greek government has requested a “transition deal” from the current program – which it has rejected – into a new, mid-term program for 2015-2018. This program has four main points:
- Transitional funding, which Greece may need until the end of August
- Balanced budget with some concessions as to the extent of surpluses
- National reform plan
- Addressing the humanitarian crisis
As explained by government sources, Greece is not asking for a new loan, nor the final 7.5-billion-euro tranche of the existing program, but rather than 1.9 billion euros of profit from Greek bonds held by the ECB and other European banks. It has also asked to raise the issuance ceiling of bonds by 10 billion euros and to use the 11.4 billion euros available in the financial stability find for “red loans”.
Regarding the primary surplus, the SYRIZA-led government want so to reduce it from 3% this year and 4.5% in 2016, to a more realistic 1.5% GDP.
