Greek fire could singe rest of euro

It's crystal clear Hollande's disastrous socialist policies are not working for France. The solution should be obvious, scrap the policies. Instead, Hollande wants a grand harmonization with the rest of Europe following the lead of France into the gutter.

Time to breathe a sigh of relief, with resolution of the Greek bailout? Not so fast. Greece is likely to need re-adjustments to its plan [0] Plenty of challenges remain in the eurozone; PIMCO's El-Erian says Portugal is next [1]. In fact, as Jeffry Frieden and I argue, the resolution of the problems facing eurozone policymakers is likely to be contentious and prolonged.

Where does the eurozone go from here? That's the question I've been looking at today for Radio 4's PM programme.

We know the Eurozone crisis is important, but in the daily talk of "bank stress tests" and "special purpose vehicles", it's easy to lose sight of the big picture: why the crisis has happened, what we should be worried about, and what could happen next. This week Robert Peston are I will be trying to step back to answer some of those big questions, in a series of essays on the Eurozone crisis for Radio 4's PM programme.

Niall Ferguson recently remarked, "[Europe] is a politicial experiment gone wrong.

The European Central Bank is prepared to cut off funding to Cyprus and let the Mediterranean island succumb to financial meltdown if it has to, confident it has unlimited firepower to protect the rest of the eurozone. Cyprus propelled the 17-nation bloc into uncharted waters on Tuesday by rejecting a proposed levy on bank deposits as a condition of a 10-billion euro (US$12.9-billion) EU bailout. Without the aid, much of it to recapitalize Cypriot banks, the ECB says they will be insolvent, and it requires banks to be solvent for them to receive central bank support.

In the wake of S&P debt downgrades, Merkel vows faster eurozone reforms. European leaders promised on Saturday to speed up plans to strengthen spending rules and get a permanent bailout fund up and running as soon as possible, a day after U.S. agency S&P cut the ratings of several euro zone countries' creditworthiness.