Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras sent a joyous message to the world of international markets on the occasion of Greece’s return to private lenders and the Resurrection of Christ. “We reached rock bottom and now we can only go up and we will only go up,” Antonis Samaras told Bloomberg before Easter in an interview published after Easter. Greece can stand on its own feet, without further assistance from euro-partners and the IMF, Samaras said among others and stressed “We don’t need more money. We have no fiscal gap, we have no financing gap and, on top of this, we have the ability to go to the markets if necessary.”
All in all and in short, Prime Minister Antonis Samaras expressed a wild galloping optimism about the economic situation of the country.
“We expect by the year 2015 that we will have not simply primary surplus, but that we’re going to have a fiscal surplus. This means we will be able on our own to pay our debt, without borrowing at all. There are very few European countries that are doing this today,” Samaras said.
For some quite weird reason Samaras’ optimism reminded me of bed-ridden grandmas Josephine and Georgina from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
Grandma Josephine “Elbows off the table, Charlie.”
Grandma Georgina “Things will only get better” 🙂
Full interview of Antonis Samaras here
PS Fasten seat belts! We take off!
If in 2015 they can pay for the debts without borrowing maybe its time to default. Then the country can grow, no more debts to pay and no burden on its peoples shoulder. But would they have the guts to do so?
why should they default then?