Greece

Not much to say that hasn’t already been said.

I saw nothing good coming out of a yes or no vote and I still see it that way.

And watch for the follow up polls on the demographics of the vote- who voted, what they say they knew about what they voted for, etc. etc.

The no vote along with the payment past due to the IMF give cause to the ECB to no longer consider Greek govt obligations as ‘eligible collateral’ for ECB loans, and maybe not count as assets for purposes of determining a bank’s equity capital. These measure could cause banks to not be able to attract euro deposits and loans, and therefore those banks would not allow their depositors to withdraw euros or transfer balances to other banks until the deposits could be replaced.

Varoufakis stated an agreement with the troika would be reached within 24 of a no vote. If so, since both what the troika offered and what Greece countered with are negatives for the Greek economy the chances of any material improvement are not good.

For all practical purposes debt relief- the write down of Greek debt- does next to nothing positive for the Greek economy, since the existing debt is already long term and at very low interest rates.

The EU has a general problem of low aggregate demand and both the troika’s and the Greek govt’s proposals are likely to further reduce public and private sector spending.

The Greek govt resorted to nationalism to promote it’s desired ‘no’ vote. Success with this tactic will only promote more of same across the EU, where in many places it’s already taken root. And let’s just say nationalism isn’t generally a force for ‘peace on earth and good will towards men’ etc.

All of this remains supportive for euro exchange rates. Unlike govt debt crises of the past which were about debt in foreign currencies, this time there won’t, for example, be any selling of euro to get the currency needed to make debt payments, as the debt is of course already in euro. So good luck to whoever is doing the selling on this news:
eur-usd