European Union

This morning, Egan-Jones Ratings slashed its rating of the Kingdom of Spain another two notches, after cutting it two notches last week, to a rating of B. For those who are unsure, Egan-Jones uses a similar scale to S&P and Fitch, so investment grade is above BBB- and sub-investment grade is BB...

From Spanish banks to Greek elections to the ECB/China/IMF saving the world rumor du jour, there has been a flurry of headlines out of Europe for the better part of the last year and it is these headlines that have been moving the market. There is reason to be alarmed and to fear, not from a Greek...

Tomorrow is the informal meeting of the European Commission and the European heads of state, which is a meeting to help set the agenda and decide on exactly what they will sign at the formal meeting in June. There will be lots of headlines and quoting of every person there, but I think that there...

Finally, the EUR/USD has broken out of its 1.30-1.33 range to the downside, as expected. The deterioration of sentiment in Europe is finally occurring, as the market wises up to the fact that the LTRO's did nothing other than buy time for the banking system. Remember, financial crises go through...

There has been a lot of weakness in growth currencies recently, largely due to fears of a continued global slowdown. Also, a weak Euro has been one of the biggest consequences of the deflating European economy. The EUR/USD Dollar cross rate has been extremely weak over the last 10 months, trading...

Greece is edging closer to having enough of the private sector holders of the country's outstanding debt accept a debt restructuring deal would see the face value of their bonds take a major, while reducing the financial burden of the nearly bankrupt Greek government. The agreement is needed in...

Reports on Monday evening were suggesting that Goldman Sachs' (NYSE: GS) secret loan to Greece was an expensive mistake from the very beginning. According to Bloomberg, the Greek government owed the band about 600 million euros ($793 million) on the day that the deal was struck back in 2001. This...

Shortly after signing an agreement with 25 other European Union leaders for a new fiscal treaty that would punish euro zone countries that failed to meet budget targets, Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy dropped the bombshell that Spain was going to run a bigger 2012 deficit than the one it had...

The leaders of most European Union countries signed a new fiscal treaty aimed at preventing another sovereign debt crisis from happening. The leaders also hope that the treaty, also referred to as the fiscal compact, will reassure the markets that troubled euro zone members like Spain and Italy...

Manufacturing activity in China is on the rise according to survey results from the latest Purchasing Managers Index in China. The Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) rose to 51.0 in February, up from 50.5 in January. A score above 50.0 is an indicator of improving economic activity. The official...