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EUROPEANS WILL BE getting less buck for their euro as the single currency has hit an almost nine-year low against the US dollar.
Fears of a Greek exit from the eurozone have been heightened as the far-left Syriza party takes a poll lead less than three weeks out from a Greek national election.
These concerns coupled with suggestions from ECB President Mario Draghi that inflation needs to be increased have led to the value of the single currency tumbling against the dollar.
After early market trading today, €1 will get you slightly below $1.19, the lowest level since March 2006.
The exchange rate has recovered slightly to $1.1950, a figure which represents a decline even on trading from Friday evening.
The chart below demonstrates how the Euro has been declining steadily against the dollar over the course of the past year, with the current level down on the 12 month euro high of €1 to $1.39 in May 2014.
A rocky Euro is nothing new and has routinely been a symptom of both New Year market volatility and political instability in periphery nations, often Greece. This latest slump is no different with Greek elections on the immediate horizon.
The head of the radical Syriza party said Saturday that if he won he would start “necessary change” in Europe and end painful austerity policies.
Over the weekend, the Der Spiegel weekly quoted German government sources as saying that Berlin sees a Greek exit from the eurozone as “almost inevitable” should Syriza party win the snap poll.
Both Merkel and her finance minister Wolfgang Schaeuble had come to consider that Greece’s departure from the single-currency bloc would be “manageable”, the magazine said.
French President Francois Hollande today urged Greece to abide by its European commitments.
“The Greeks are free to choose their own destiny. But, having said that, there are certain engagements that have been made and all those must be of course respected,” Hollande told French radio.
Super Mario
The euro’s losses meanwhile added to a sell-off on Friday that came in response to an interview with Draghi in German business daily Handelsblatt.
Draghi had said that deflation was a threat to the eurozone and the ECB needs to be prepared to counter it. He added that the risk that the central bank will not be able to push inflation up “has increased compared to six months ago”.
Additional reporting by © – AFP 2015
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Where’s Flesh Gordon?
Ha – that was a classic.
Good article. A lot of work. I’ll be lining up bittorent before I go to work tonight.
The Star Wars prequels are some of the sh*ttest films ever made. Can anyone quote a character from them? I bet you can’t, because they have some of the worst convoluted writing ever.
I’ll agree with you on the first two (aimed at kids to sell toys) but the third one was probably the best of all the films.
Have you forgotten about jar jar?
“May the force be with you”
3rd film was the worst of them.
Are we alone in the universe? One of those great questions. I think it was Stephen Hawkins who said it it both equally terrifying to think we either are alone or not.
No Wall-e? I think that will come to be seen as a real inspiration to kids to get into science.
Sandra Bullock defies gravity
‘Moon’ should have been given more attention, definitely over Sunshine for 2000s. Sam Rockwell is an amazing actor!
70s a golden generation for the genre. I thought moon was a good story and more recently oblivion looked good on the silver screen.
I thought Dune was terrible. Even Captain Picard couldn’t save it.
Good article – should do one on TV and outer space
If this shows anything it’s that some brilliant science fiction books were bastardised in to some god awful movies. I’m especially thinking of Dune and Starship Troopers.
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