Central banks

Athens appeared to toughen its stance vis-a-vis the country's creditors on Tuesday after official figures indicated that the economy performed better than expected at the end of last year.

In comments at a media briefing, government spokesman Dimitris Tzanakopoulos said Greece was aiming to reach an agreement "without one euro more" in austerity measures.

Turkey has implemented comprehensive and robust monetary tightening to contain rising inflation, Central Bank Governor Murat Çetinkaya said on Feb. 9.    

The International Monetary Fund's stance on the Greek bailout is "problematic" and its demands of the cash-strapped country "unreasonable," Labor Minister Efi Achtsioglou said on Thursday.

Greece has been effectively locked out of the secondary bond markets since January 31, as the yield on its bonds frequently rises above 8 percent - deemed the high-risk line - and the situation is not improving.

The U.S. administration should blame itself rather than Germany for a recent strengthening of the dollar against the euro, the head of Germany's Bundesbank said on Feb. 7.

Jens Weidmann said comments by a top trade adviser of U.S. President Donald Trump that Germany was exploiting the United States and its European partners with an overly weak euro were "more than absurd." 

Greece wants a bailout review conclusion with its foreign lenders to take part in the ECB's bond buying scheme but will not concede to "illogical" demands by the IMF for more austerity after its program ends in 2018, the government spokesman said.

The European Central Bank follows the same rules in every country where it buys bonds, its president said on Monday, responding to a question about reimbursing investors in Greek government debt.

Greece would be admitted in the European Central Bank’s (ECB) quantitative easing (QE) program only when the EU institutions and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) agreed on the implementation of debt relief measures after 2018, said the European Central bank (ECB) President Mario Draghi.

The European Central Bank lowered the cap on emergency liquidity assistance (ELA) Greek banks draw from the domestic central bank by 200 million euros to 46.3 billion euros, the Bank of Greece said on Thursday.

The move reflected improving liquidity conditions and the stabilization of private sector deposit flows, it said.

The ELA ceiling is valid up to February 15.

Europe's economic recovery is gathering speed, with growth up, inflation spiking sharply higher and unemployment at its lowest in nearly eight years, official figures showed Tuesday.