While Greek officials have repeatedly claimed that Greece could show signs of recovery in the latter stages of 2016, a report by CNBC appears less optimistic.
In an article entitled “Don’t bet on a happy new year for Greece,” the author recaps Greece’s financial woes, including the 330 billion euros it has borrowed since 2010, and looks into the challenges of the new year.
Raoul Ruparel, co-director of the Open Europe think tank is quoted as questioning Greece’s plans and the actual implementation of the bailout.
“Fundamentally, Greece lacks a growth strategy or even a strategy more broadly,”he said and added “the government is passing the necessary reforms but it does not support them or buy into them. Questions necessarily arise whether these reforms are actually going to be implemented. There is still a huge amount to be done to improve the business climate in Greece. Currently the government is caught between not buying into the euro zone strategy but not having any other option.”
The article then asks if the bailout will work and looks into SYRIZA’s declining popular support in combination with the upcoming burdensome reforms in pensions and increases in farmer taxation.
“The pledges of debt relief and Greece’s inclusion in the ECB’s QE program are powerful incentives for Tsipras to keep pushing, but it is difficult to see how his coalition could approve all of the required measures with its existing, thin majority, especially if the lenders’ position toughens again,” Wolfango Piccoli, managing director at Teneo Intelligence, is quoted as saying.
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