Japan welcomes the progress of the Eurozone but worries on Spain
Japanese Finance Minister, Jun Azumi, welcomed on Tuesday the recent progress made by the eurozone to its debt crisis, but also expressed concern over Spain.
“The European situation has calmed down. Measures taken by the European Central Bank late last year have been very effective,” he said at a press conference, quoted by the online edition of business daily Nikkei.
In late December, the ECB lent 489 000 to 523 million European banks to relax credit conditions on the continent, strained by debt problems in the euro area. The European Central Bank (ECB) repeated this operation primarily in late February, this time with 529,530 million to 800 European banks.
Azumi also welcomed the decision of coming by the finance ministers of the monetary union to strengthen the intervention fund in the area and set a new ceiling of 800,000 million euros.
But he warned that the debt problems of European countries have done. “There is a concern regarding the obligations of State of Spain,” he said.
The interest charged on the loan market for Spanish public reference to 10 years have been maintained in recent weeks to more than 5%, despite the commitment of Madrid, claimed by Brussels to cut its deficit to 5.3% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2012, after reaching 8.51% in 2011.
Asked about Japan’s position regarding the increase in IMF resources to support European finance, Azumi said that Tokyo has not decided anything yet.
Category: Money
