It helps to remember from time to time that the Euro is not the only currency in the EU. The EU has 28 member states, of which 11 states have their own currency. Of course, the EZ member states have by far the bulk of the EU's GDP but, nevertheless, the EU is an economic and political union which has a total of 12 currencies.
Too bad if only one of the twelve currencies would bring the entire EU down!
EU members | EZ members | Local currency | ||||||
1 | Austria | 1 | Austria | |||||
2 | Belgium | 2 | Belgium | |||||
3 | Bulgaria | 1 | lev | |||||
4 | Croatia | 2 | kuna | |||||
5 | Cyprus | 3 | Cyprus | |||||
6 | Czech Republic | 3 | koruna | |||||
7 | Denmark | 4 | krone | |||||
8 | Estonia | 4 | Estonia | |||||
9 | Finland | 5 | Finland | |||||
10 | France | 6 | France | |||||
11 | Germany | 7 | Germany | |||||
12 | Greece | 8 | Greece | |||||
13 | Hungary | 5 | forint | |||||
14 | Ireland | 9 | Ireland | |||||
15 | Italy | 10 | Italy | |||||
16 | Latvia | 6 | lats | |||||
17 | Lithuania | 7 | litas | |||||
18 | Luxembourg | 11 | Luxembourg | |||||
19 | Malta | 12 | Malta | |||||
20 | Netherlands | 13 | Netherlands | |||||
21 | Poland | 8 | sloty | |||||
22 | Portugal | 14 | Portugal | |||||
23 | Romania | 9 | leu | |||||
24 | Slovakia | 15 | Slovakia | |||||
25 | Slovenia | 16 | Slovenia | |||||
26 | Spain | 17 | Spain | |||||
27 | Sweden | 10 | krona | |||||
28 | UK | 11 | pd.sterling |
Too bad if only one of the twelve currencies would bring the entire EU down!
I'd be surprised if one currency brought the EU down - it's the dollar that's unstable right now. For all their bluster and AAA rating, it's far from being what they claim.
ReplyDeleteAt least the EU countries are being held to account in terms of their finances - the US is avoiding doing this, and thereby leave themselves the weaker. This from two perspectives: firstly their avoiding the problem means they're well out of practice when it comes to making hard decisions. Secondly, when something does happen the other side of this is that there'll be nothing the Americans can do to stop it happening.
I'd be interested in your thoughts as to how Germany's financing countries like Greece means that the government of Greece is being allowed to escape its responsibilities.
I believe some of those other currencies are pegged to the Euro at a fixed rate. Does that make them susceptible to the fallout from a Euro failure?
ReplyDeleteIn other words would the Krona follow the new Mark into the stratosphere and the Litas the New Lira into the Mariana Trench.
Also, assuming the Fed stops printing dollars (i.e. it doesn't confect some different colour fairy dust to replace QE) will the ECB do the same. Can it afford to do so, can it afford not to do so?
I suspect the BoE will follow suit; given that its more or less the Fed's offshore district office.
CK
I've decoupled from Google etc - got caught up in the Snowden v NSA wars, along with tens of thousands of others, many of whom are Texan born & bred.
The NSA had no choice but to close Lavabit (a small no-frills/no ads commercial mail service) because the Repubs went ballistic after the Human Rights Watch Moscow agent broadcast Snowden's Lavabit email address on her Facebook page. My primary email account was with Lavabit.
I wonder if the Repubs became aware of the HRW agents blunder when it was gleefully reported in the UK Torygraph.
There's one thing we shall never run short of - useful idiots.
ck