After marathon negotiations lasting a full 11 hours, the finance ministers of the European Union agreed on the final establishment of a crisis fund to assist eurozone countries, which is intended to prevent the decline of the European currency, reports hrt.hr
The fund is worth a full 720 billion euros. This news had a positive impact on the currency markets. The price of the euro jumped from 1.2752 dollars, which it was on Friday, to 1.2975 dollars. Against the Japanese currency, to which the price of the euro fell to its lowest level since 2001 last week, the euro strengthened this morning by more than 2 percent, to 120.58 yen. The ministers began an extraordinary meeting on Sunday afternoon to adopt measures aimed at preventing the spread of the Greek crisis to other eurozone members. According to Olli Rehn, the European Commissioner for Economic and Monetary Affairs, of that amount, 60 billion would be provided by the Commission, that is, the European budget, 440 billion would be provided by eurozone member states in the form of bilateral loans or guarantees, and 220 billion would be provided by the International Monetary Fund. (www.hrt.hr)
