Italy

After the crisis year of 2020, the next 12 months will decide if Italy can get its economy, financial system and public finances under control again.

No matter how much fiscal support he will receive, it will do nothing to reverse Italy’s productivity trajectory.

If Italy fails – and there is a temptation to write ‘When’ instead of ‘If’ – it will be a catastrophe not just for Italy.

According to Karl Marx, history repeats itself – the first time as tragedy and the second time as farce.

Now that the Greek banks have re-opened, the third bailout package is on the way and something vaguely resembling normalcy is returning to Greece, we can finally deal with other things again: the euro crisis, for example.

The next stages of the euro crisis are already programmed into the system.

As government debt in the European periphery becomes a riskier investment, the yields on periphery government yields are not going up as one might expect.

Just when many commentators thought the euro crisis was over, Italy’s political earthquake has put it back on the agenda.