Bailouts, Country Bailout | featured news

As Cypriot politicians raced to find a new financial rescue plan ahead of a Monday deadline, tensions built in the streets of the capital. Residents withdrew what money they could from ATMs amid concern the banks could collapse.

Spain has at last conceded it may need a state bailout and policymakers are considering writing down Greek debt to their central banks, European officials said on Friday, as markets anticipated radical new action to pull the continent out of its debt maelstrom.

Spain's 17 regional governments are a big part of the country's financial problems. Like the regional savings banks, they are victims of the country's property boom and bust. During the boom years, regional government tax revenues were swelled by stamp duties on property sales, and by income taxes paid by immigrants that came to work on the country's construction sites... Then the bust came...

BERLIN —Greece’s new leaders have had only a month to confront their country’s dismal tangle of economic problems, but some in Europe think the troubled Mediterranean country is up against a hopeless task.

The Spanish government's most recent reforms will slash 56.4 billion euros ($69 billion) from the public deficit in the next two and a half years, an official document showed on Saturday, leaving a gap to be filled by taxes on energy.

Italy and Spain, battling searing market pressure in the euro zone's widening debt crisis, blocked agreement on measures to promote growth at a European Union summit on Thursday to demand urgent action to bring down their borrowing costs.

Cyprus, the fifth euro zone country to seek emergency funding from Europe, may need a bailout of up to 10 billion euros — over half the size of its economy — officials said.

Spain's government said Friday it plans to make its official request for EU aid for its banking sector Monday, as discussions continue on ways to inject European aid funds directly into ailing Spanish banks.

Greece's new government promised on Thursday to renegotiate the terms of the country's bailout without endangering its future in the euro, responding to intense pressure to ease mounting social tensions but also risking a showdown with European powers.

Spain's banks would need 51-62 billion euros ($64-78 billion) in extra capital to weather a serious downturn in the economy, less than a 100-billion-euro aid package offered by the euro zone, independent audits showed on Thursday.