PARIS (MNI) – A debt default by Greece would be much more costly
than the financial aid to rescue it, French Budget Minister Valerie
Pecresse said Wednesday.
“We are doing everything today to save Greece,” Pecresse said in a
radio interview. “Today we can save Greece.”
The alternative of debt default “is not the scenario we are in
today,” she said. “It would cost us much more to imagine any other
scenario.”
The day after the IMF revised down its forecast for French GDP
growth next year from 1.9% to 1.4%, the minister said her government was
sticking to its growth assumption of 1.75%, which was revised down last
month from 2.25% as a measure of “realism” and “caution.”
Most independent analysts fear that French growth next year will be
closer to 1.2%, with forecasts ranging from 0.8% to 1.7%, according to a
survey by the national Economic Commission. Most analysts also think
that next year’s public deficit target of 4.5% of GDP will be overshot
by at least 0.4 percentage point.
–Paris newsroom +331 4271 5540; Email: ssandelius@marketnews.com.
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