Monti Sees Light in Euro Tunnel, But ECB Hopes Dim
Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti said on Tuesday that Europe was starting to see light at the end of the tunnel of the euro zone’s sovereign debt crisis, belying a welter of deteriorating economic data.
As euro-zone unemployment hit a euro-era high and Spanish data showed capital fleeing its banks and retail sales falling again, Monti’s optimism was at odds with sentiment in markets, which are losing hope of swift intervention by the European Central Bank to address the region’s problems.
Monti has campaigned for concerted action by the euro zone’s rescue funds and the ECB to bring down ruinous borrowing costs that threaten to force Spain and Italy, the currency bloc’s third and fourth largest economies, out of credit markets.
