‘Deal on bank debt before Christmas’
The Eurogroup source says that Ireland has met all its IMF/EU bailout programme conditions and that has to be acknowledged. Crucially for Ireland, a deal on the bank debt is not dependent on Spain entering some sort of a programme. “Ireland can be dealt with separately. There is no reason why this cannot be the case. Spain seems to think it does not have to make its mind up [about a bailout].”
The German Chancellor Angela Merkel appeared to pour cold water on a potential bank debt deal for Ireland. At an annual press briefing on Monday she said this country was making very good progress and she did not see any need to change the conditions of the bailout agreement. But the Eurogroup source said “that is not the same interpretation [of these comments] as we are taking.”
