Greece

Greece’s parliament approved a raft of fresh taxes and austerity measures that the country must legislate to unlock further rescue loans, as the country’s most influential creditors—Germany and the International Monetary Fund—remain deadlocked over debt relief, the International New York Times reported. The measures were backed by the 153 lawmakers from the ruling Syriza party and its junior coalition partner, the Independent Greeks, securing the majority in the 300-seat parliament late Sunday.

A senior International Monetary Fund official on Thursday cooled European hopes to secure IMF backing for a Greek bailout plan soon and opened the door for emergency financing without new loans from the fund, The Wall Street Journal reported. “For the IMF to participate in the program with financing, both credible policies and substantial debt relief will be needed,” IMF spokesman Gerry Rice told reporters in a briefing.

The International Monetary Fund is demanding that Europe free Greece from all payments on its bailout loans until 2040, in the opening bid of a struggle that pits IMF math against German muscle, The Wall Street Journal reported. A new IMF proposal shared with Europe late last week goes far beyond what Greece’s eurozone creditors, led by Germany, have said they are willing to do to help the country regain its financial health. Germany is leading the pressure on the IMF to dilute its demands and rejoin the Greek bailout program as a lender.

KKR & Co. has signed an agreement with two of Greece’s leading banks to manage up to €1.2 billion ($1.35 billion) of their problem loans, the latest effort by the struggling Greek banking sector to restructure bad debts festering on their balance sheets, The Wall Street Journal reported. The U.S.-based private equity group said in a statement it will help manage underperforming assets owned by Alpha Bank and Eurobank, Greece’s third and fourth largest lenders respectively, via its platform, known as Pillarstone.

Greece will not accept a bailout deal without a concrete agreement for debt relief from the country’s European creditors, a top aide to Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said, The Wall Street Journal reported. “We want real solutions, not interim solutions,” Nikos Pappas, Greece’s Minister of State, said in an interview Friday after several days of talks with senior U.S. officials. “No more kicking the can down the road.” Although Mr.

In Europe’s battle with the International Monetary Fund over Greece, Germany has a way to win, The Wall Street Journal reported. Germany, Europe’s dominant economic power, is leaning heavily on the IMF to accept hypothetical assurances that Greece’s debt burden will be addressed in the future if needed, rather than the definite and far-reaching debt relief that the IMF wanted, according to people familiar with the talks. Berlin believes the IMF will have to accept what’s on offer, even if IMF staff are unhappy about it, these people say.

Greece is invariably held up as Exhibit One in the case against the European Union. Its six-year debt crisis—now threatening to reignite right before a British referendum on EU membership—is often presented as proof that the EU is an anti-democratic, sovereignty-destroying, austerity-loving bully. But this narrative is wide of the mark, The Wall Street Journal reported in a commentary.

Greece’s leader Alexis Tsipras on Tuesday claimed a major breakthrough in its debt-and-austerity talks, even as officials from Greece’s creditors warned that big obstacles remain to a deal that keeps the country afloat this summer, The Wall Street Journal reported. “After six years of continued cuts, bad news and harsh austerity, we finally had some good news,” Mr. Tsipras said in a televised speech to his cabinet. He said Greece was on course to get fresh bailout loans without having to legislate additional austerity measures.

A confidential document debated by eurozone finance ministers detailed for the first time what Greece’s creditors could do to ease the country’s debt load and how that burden would develop over the coming decades without new relief measures. The document, which was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, served as the basis of Monday’s emergency meeting, in which the ministers discussed for the first time the possibility of further debt relief for Greece.

Greece returns to center stage on Monday when aid deliberations by its international creditors will signal whether the country faces a renewed period of political drift or wins some economic breathing space after six years of turbulence, Bloomberg News reported. The euro area and the International Monetary Fund will assess whether Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has made enough budget-tightening commitments to gain another aid disbursement. At issue is an IMF demand for fiscal “contingency measures” worth about 3.5 billion euros ($4 billion) in case Greece strays off budgetary course.