Big news for this week!

Below are some announcements that may impact the markets this week:

(All Times are in GMT)

News Event Analysis

Feb 26th 10:15 GMT LTROThe Long Term Refinancing Operation is a process for the ECB provides financing to European banks.  The aim is to ensure that banks have enough liquidity when they are holding illiquid assets.  The idea is that this will allow for greater interbank lending and will stop a credit squeeze (as happened in 2008).

Market News

EUR/GBP has reached new lows of 0.7339, not seen since December 2007.  Rumours circulated that the Eurogroup meeting has been postponed (at the time of writing) for a few hours as the ECB makes preparations for a Greek exit from the Eurozone. The implications are immense and the Euro is now being sold heavily.  Note: Greek bank holiday on Monday (Ash Monday). 

 
Greek debt (or tragedy)

Germany (basically the largest single Eurozone creditor) wants Greece to repay its debts in full.  Greece, on the other hand, wants to negotiate better terms.  There is a standoff as time runs out for Greece to pay back its debt obligations.  As you can see from the graph below, 2015 is a big year for repayments.

A few facts:

Approximately Euro 195 billion is owed by Greece to euro-regional governments (about 60% of total debt).

Greece's total public debt is in the region of Euro 315 billion.

Greece's largest creditor is the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) or about 45% of the total debt. The debt matures over the next 32 years and Greece pays approximately 1.5% on the loans.

 The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is owed approximately Euro 25 billion.  The interest rate is not fixed and averages about 3 to 4 percent.

Happy Trading

The Hirose UK Team