Greece is just an Hors D'oeurve.
Wait till you see the main course!
What does Greece really have to lose by declaring bankruptcy and writing off the entire debt?
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/5530f788-1288-11e5-bcc2-00144feabdc0.html#axzz3d8QxmNMyGreek default fears rise as ‘11th-hour’ talks collapse
Talks aimed at reaching an 11th-hour deal between Greek ministers and their bailout creditors collapsed on Sunday evening after a new economic reform proposal submitted by Athens was deemed inadequate to continue negotiations.
The breakdown is the clearest sign yet that differences between the two sides may be too wide to breach, increasing the possibility that Athens will not secure the €7.2bn in bailout aid it needs to avoid defaulting on its debts — including a €1.5bn loan repayment due to the International Monetary Fund in just two weeks.
Greek negotiators, including Nikos Pappas, aide-de-camp to Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, left the European Commission only 45 minutes after entering.
A commission spokesman said there remained a “significant gap” between the sides, amounting to up to €2bn per year, and there was no longer time to reach a “positive assessment” of Greek efforts before a meeting of eurozone finance ministers on Thursday.
“While some progress was made, the talks did not succeed,” said the spokesman. “On this basis, further discussion will now have to take place in the eurogroup.”
The eurogroup meeting is seen by many officials as the last chance for Athens to secure agreement on a list of economic reforms its creditors are demanding in order to release the €7.2bn before Greece’s EU bailout runs out at the end of the month.
Without the endorsement of Greece’s trio of bailout monitors — the commission, the International Monetary Fund and the European Central Bank — the chances of an amicable agreement on Thursday are remote, raising the prospect eurozone negotiators may resort to the “take it or leave it” strategy used on Cyprus at a eurogroup meeting two years ago.
On that occasion, an ECB representative warned that without a deal, it would be forced to cut all emergency funding to Cypriot banks — essentially laying waste to the country’s financial system. The ECB has faced pressure in the past week to take the same stance with Athens.
One senior official involved in the talks said there could still be a compromise on Thursday if Greek negotiators “go back to Athens and say, ‘Oh shit, we have to do something’.” But the official acknowledged such a U-turn was unlikely.
Yannis Dragasakis, deputy prime minister and head of the negotiating team in Brussels, said after the talks broke up that Athens remained “ready” to complete the negotiations and blamed Greece’s creditors for being intransigent in their insistence on pension cuts and increases in the country’s value added tax that Athens believe will hit essential services.
