Germany Wants to Make Offer Greece Can't Refuse

It is possible if not likely we have to suffer through at least 11 more Groundhog days as Greece sets March 8 deadline for investors in bond swap.

Greece has set a March 8 deadline for investors to participate in its unprecedented bond swap aimed at sharply reducing its debt burden, according to a document outlining the offer.

Greece formally launched the bond swap offer to private holders of its bonds on Friday, setting in motion the largest-ever sovereign debt restructuring in the hope of getting its finances back on track.

In the document, Greece said the March 8 deadline could be extended if needed. Athens in the past has said it wants to conclude the transaction by March 12.

With German Chancellor Angela Merkel facing a parliamentary vote Monday on a second Greek bailout, her interior minister, Hans-Peter Friedrich came out over the weekend in favour of Greece leaving the eurozone.

Friedrich told the news magazine Der Spiegel, “I do not mean that Greece should be kicked out of” the 17-nation eurozone, but he said the bloc should “create incentives for an exit that they cannot turn down.”

Merkel is opposed to Greece leaving the eurozone, and agreed in January with French President Nicolas Sarkozy that Greece should be kept in the monetary union, as long as its government imposes strict budgetary reforms. She expects the Bundestag to approve the second bailout package in a vote Monday.

Friedrich, of the CSU, the Bavarian sister party to Merkel’s Christian Democrats, is the first member of the federal government to have spoken out suggesting a radical change of course in euro crisis policy.

“Outside European monetary union, Greece’s chances of regenerating itself and becoming competitive are definitely better than if it remained inside the eurozone,” Friedrich told Der Spiegel.

Meanwhile, at a meeting of G20 finance ministers and central bankers in Mexico City, German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble said it made “no economic sense” to be “endlessly” pumping money into eurozone rescue funds.

I vote for door number 2.

160 German Tax Collectors Volunteer to "Help" Greece

Goodness gracious, how gracious! The German business weekly WirtschaftsWoche reported Saturday that Germany offers to send tax men to Greece

The German government is prepared to send 160 financial experts to Greece to help the country overhaul its tax collection, the business weekly WirtschaftsWoche reported Saturday.

Hans Bernhard Beus, deputy finance minister, told the magazine that the tax officials are ready to jump in to help the ailing country. They would need to at least speak English, but about a dozen of the volunteers speak Greek, he said.

A large number of the volunteers would come from western German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, where state Finance Minister Norbert Walter-Borjans of the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) told WirtschaftsWoche: “Greece is facing the problems that former East Germany faced in 1990.”

The central German state of Hesse is also prepared to send in volunteers, the state’s Finance Minister Thomas Schäfer of the conservative Christian Democrats (CDU) said.

“In helping Greece, we should also entertain the idea of bringing in retired tax collectors, because considerable practical experience could be used here,” he told WirtschaftsWoche.

In January, the Greek government released a 170-page list of 4,000 tax evaders, who owe the state approximately €15 billion. The Greek government under Prime Minister Lucas Papademos has announced that it will be seriously pursuing tax evaders.

Is this tax collection help or the beginning of colonization?

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com