Euro area finance ministers released final tranche of funding of the Greek bailout – RBC CM

Research Team at RBC Capital Markets, notes that yesterday the Euro area finance ministers released €1.1bn of the €2.8bn final tranche of funding under the first review of the Greek bailout delaying the dispersal of an additional €1.7bn, which is linked to the payment of arrears, until data for the clearance of arrears for September is provided by the Greek authorities.

Key Quotes

“The Greek ministry of finance said that the data should be available ahead of the next ESM board meeting on October 24th allowing it to approve dispersal at that stage.

That would complete the first review of the third Greek programme, an important step for the Greek government as the euro area indicated in May that discussions on debt relief would commence once the first review was concluded.

Officials are expected to return to Athens on October 18 to start work on the second review. Completion of the first review was dependent on Greece legislating for a number of ‘prior actions’ with the focus now moving to implementation of the measures.

The Greek government is seeking a swift completion of the second review "Our aim is the second review to be completed until the end of November” to allow debt restructuring talks to begin. Eurogroup president Dijsselbloem was more evasive on a timetable for those talks saying only “we will now focus on the second review, which we expect to be completed swiftly and we will come back to that in next meetings” adding only that debt relief would be discussed “at a later point”.

On IMF involvement, Dijsselbloem he said he hoped the fund would make a decision on its involvement in the Greek bailout before the end of the year. The IMF’s position is that restructuring of Greece’s debt is necessary to ensure its sustainability; a necessary condition for its future involvement in the Greek programme.”