Will the nation stay in the euro, negotiate an exit, or be chased outside of the monetary union?Greece stays in the euro Likelihood: 2/5After an election that pushed Greece’s pro-euro parties into a minority, the prospects for this scenario gaze slim. The nation’s mainstream parties – the fair-of-centre Fresh Democracy party and the social democrat party Pasok – saw their ballot collapse to 32%, which translates as 149 outside of 300 parliamentary seats. Compare this result with Pasok’s landslide victory in the at the end election in 2009, when it gained 44% on its own.However that’s not the end of the tale. After looking into the abyss, the majority of Greeks who tell pollsters they desire to stay in the euro could bring themselves to support pro-euro parties in a second election. After all, they didn’t ballot for far-left or far-fair parties just on the euro issue. Pasok’s leader, Evangelos Venizelos, was punished in part for favouring cuts hitting the poor and public sector wages and ignoring the wealth and incomes of the richest that go untaxed to the tune of €77bn (£62bn).The Fresh Democracy leader, Antonis Samaras, was punished for underestimating the huge rage of the population over economic hardship, mismanagement and corruption when he insisted on calling Sunday’s ballot instead of allowing the interim prime minister, Lucas Papademos, to continue.A second election would give the pro-euro majority a chance to rein in their rage and ballot for one of the two main parties. Greece could then bid for more concessions from Brussels.Greece negotiates an exit Likelihood: 4/5The meteoric rise of the radical left coalition Syriza and its charismatic leader, Alexis Tsipras, 37, is the largest surprise of Sunday’s ballot. Tsipras, whose party came second with nearly 17% of the ballot to Fresh Democracy’s 18.8%, received a three-day mandate from President Karolos Papoulias on Tuesday and is expected to employ every hour to meet a wide range of social groups as well as the other parties.Tsipras says he wants to stay in the euro, however with a radically different bailout deal and an easing of public spending cuts and structural reforms.He has been rejected by the communists, who desire outside of the euro complete stop. There is a hint he will sign up with Pasok, however he has already told the two main parties they must renounce all their previous negotiations in Brussels before he will sit down with them.Pride is a huge factor in such negotiations and it seems unlikely Pasok will succumb, despite its dismal 13.2% showing. Tsipras simply does not have the numbers, with only 52 seats and the Democratic left’s 19, to form his own leftwing alliance.An impasse could lead to a negotiated exit after Brussels and Berlin assent Greek politics is so fragmented and polarised that no conclusion is likely. If Pasok and Syriza assent there is no path forward, it could energy a ballot and, with the support of communists and the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party, send representatives to conclude Athens’s departure from the euro.Greece is chased outside Likelihood: 3/5The inconclusive election on Sunday could be followed by another in a hardly any months. Riots and fractious parliamentary disputes could delay spending cuts and reforms demanded by Brussels and Berlin. Without much more procrastination, a breakdown might lead Brussels to conclude that Greece has such deep-seated internal problems that bailout funds must be switched off.Without the method to pay public sector workers and fulfil contracts, the parliament pulls outside of the euro. It is Argentina and Iceland all over again. Foreign creditors are told loans will not be repaid.Border controls block all money leaving the nation. Drachmas worth encircling 10% of the euro are distributed by community banks, which are nationalised to stop them going bust.Unlike Argentina and Iceland, the devaluation has knock-on effects for other countries, in particular Portugal, Ireland, Italy and Spain. On the basis that investors may not get their money back from these countries, they commence pulling their funds outside, leaving Brussels with an much larger bailout bill than for Greece – much a Greece entirely dependent on eurozone countries for loans and handouts.GreeceEurozone crisisEuropean monetary unionEuroEuropeEuropean UnionEconomicsBankingEuropean banksFinancial crisisFinancial sectorPhillip Inmanguardian.co.uk © 2012 Twitter News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Employ of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
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