If you’re gonna lead people, you have to have somewhere to go
The euro zone’s debt crisis deepened on Tuesday as investors pushed the spreads on Spanish, Italian and Belgian bonds to euro lifetime highs and Portugal warned of “intolerable risks” facing its banks. (…)
Two days after the bloc approved an 85 billion euro ($111.7 billion) emergency aid package for Ireland, worries about contagion to Portugal and Spain persisted and the borrowing costs of large countries like Italy and France shot higher.
Markets are already discounting an eventual rescue of Portugal although the government in Lisbon denies, as Irish leaders initially did, that the country needs outside aid. (…)
Eurointelligence, an online commentary service, said markets were growing increasingly concerned about the solvency of euro zone peripheral states after focusing mainly on their short-term liquidity problems in past weeks.
“We at Eurointelligence consider a default of Greece, Ireland and Portugal a done deal,” they wrote on Tuesday. “The question is only now whether Spain can scrape through.”
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