Stournaras: Greece to ease capital controls soon, needs debt measures

Greece will soon ease capital controls further but full liberalization will depend on progress in easing the country's debt burden, which is also a precondition for entering the ECB's asset buying scheme, central bank chief Yannis Stournaras said.

Propped up by three successive bailouts, Greece hopes to emerge from a long recession next year. But much of its outlook depends on getting a long-sought reduction of its huge debt pile, easing capital restrictions and inclusion in the ECB's 1.74 trillion asset buying scheme.

"We gradually lift capital controls and the next step will take place soon," Stournaras, a European Central Bank Governing Council member, told Reuters in an interview. "The full lifting of capital controls is the end of the road."

"To get there we need the finishing off of the second (bailout program) evaluation, discussion on debt...