With all the doom, gloom, recession and depression associated with Greece, also some good news can be found.
No, Greece isn’t close to meeting the bailout targets or returning to growth, but not all is lost. Here are 3 positive news:
- Economy shrinks less than expected: In Q2 2012, the economy shrank at an annual rate of 6.2% returned to the output last seen in 2005. The good news is that Greece squeezed by 6.5% in Q1 and economists’ expectations for a squeeze of 7%. So, Greece actually exceeded expectations.
- Greece raises money in the markets: The Hellenic Republic issued 3 month T-bills and raised 4.062 billion euros. This money is more than enough to cover the upcoming bond payment of 3.2 billion euros to the ECB on August 20th. Don’t get too excited: this doesn’t mark the return of Greece to bond markets. The ECB changed its rules so that Greek banks could borrow money to buy these bonds and use them as collateral with the ECB, in a “revolving doors” operation buys Greece more time.
- The Greek shipping industry is on a roll: Contrary to the rest of the economy, shipping is doing really well. They sold ships at the top of the boom, and are now snapping good ships for bargain prices from… German companies who are financially distressed in this sector. Quite amazing.
This quiet period will probably not last too long. Greece is still at the mercy of the troika. The head of the Eurogroup, Jean-Claude Juncker slipped a warning sign while seemingly to express optimism: he ruled out a Greek euro exit “at least until the end of the autumn. And after that, too.”. This doesn’t sound very convincing.
Further reading: How to trade the Grexit with EUR/USD
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