Euro Tumbles on Renewed Greek Worries

By: Barbara Zigah

Following a surprise announcement that the E.U. would not make a do-or-die decision on the Greek bailout loan, the Euro tumbled to a 3-week low against the U.S. Dollar on renewed worries that Greece will be unable to meet its March 20th debt obligations. According to unnamed sources, the E.U.’s leadership is examining ways to hold back the bailout loan until after the next Greek elections. This was spurred on by a comment made by one official in the running for the prime minister’s seat who said that if he were elected he would put the loan agreement back on the table to be re-worked.

As reported at 10:49 p.m. (JST) in Tokyo the Euro slipped to $1.3007, a drop of 0.4% and falling below recent support levels before settling back at 1.3109 more recently. The Euro also fell against the Japanese Yen, dropping at one point to 102.03 Yen before recovering to 102.11.

In the U.S., the release yesterday of the Federal Reserve’s FOMC minutes of the January meeting yielded few surprises, but some members of the committee are suggesting that another round of quantitative easing could be a possibility if the U.S. economy should back-pedal.