PARIS (MNI) – There is no systemic problem in the Eurozone and the
single currency is not about to disappear any time soon, Angel Gurria,
secretary general of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and
Development, said in a television interview Thursday.
“Frankly the euro has a long life. More countries are going to want
to join the euro,” Gurria told CNBC, adding his voice to the chorus of
senior officials who rushed to the defense of the single currency at the
World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland.
“This is not a systemic problem of the euro,” Gurria asserted.
“This is about some [EMU] members having problems. In particular, he
mentioned Ireland, which is going through a delayed banking crisis, and
Spain, where he said the market’s negative view is unjustified.
“Basically there isn’t any reason why there should be market
pressures on Spain like that; they’re dealing with all the right issues
and doing it at the right time,” he argued.
Gurria also noted that Eurozone governments and institutions “have
never been better prepared” than they are now, after having extended aid
to Greece and Ireland and created, in cooperation with the IMF, a rescue
fund to deal with possible future problems.
“Now they have half a trillion euros ready, and they have the ECB
with another quarter trillion or whatever to fund the banks, and they
have the IMF with another quarter trillion,” Gurria noted. “So you’ve
got a full trillion; that’s before they start talking about making it
bigger. They’ve never been better prepared to address issues if they
come.”
Earlier today, French President Nicolas Sarkozy launched an
impassioned defense of the euro, saying he and German Chancellor Angela
Merkel “will never, never let the euro be destroyed.” The disappearance
of the euro would be “cataclysmic” for Europe and cannot even be
considered, he said.
–Paris newsroom, +331-42-71-55-40; bwolfson@marketnews.com
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