A race to secure the sixth tranche disbursement for the 29th

An additional 30 billion to strengthen the financial system emerged during the meeting of the House Finance Committee, which met to ratify the relevant legal amendment, in effect leading to a final amount of 60 billion from the 30 billion planned (originally 15 billion).

Furthermore, Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos announced that after "lengthy discussions" he had with the governor of the Bank of Greece, "I received my letter asking for the immediate operation of the guarantee system, and he asks for an article to be added to the legislative act which increases guarantees from 30bil to 60bil. The letter of the Governor is available, as well as the list of guarantees given to banks. "

In addition, Mr. Venizelos said that the amounts approved for banks from 2008 up to now amounted to 155billion, of which more than 106 billion is enabled. Furthermore, the Minister said, "It is 5 billion in preference shares, of which approximately 3 billion is enabled, guarantees of 85 billion to the European Central Bank, of which 65 billion is activated, special bonds of 8 billion, out of which 7.8 is activated, Bank of Greece guarantees of 60 billion”; thus, Mr Venizelos described how the “banking system is guaranteed with unlimited liquidity”.

Mr. Venizelos was hopeful that “by November 29 things will be clear, when the green light for the sixth tranche is be given and we can push for the new program”, noting that he spoke about this with Mr. Olli Rehn and his German and French counterparts.

Moreover, he said that "the audit conducted by Blackrock is checking the portfolios of banks and the final report will occur if you receive additional assistance", but left open the possibility that the recapitalization of banks bears the' tax legislation that will harmonize the fulfilment of tax obligations for banks so as not to need more funds to recapitalize ... this can double the time of fulfillment of tax obligations. "

Switzerland – Big Debtors

Mr. Venizelos spoke about the progress of negotiations with the Swiss authorities on agreeing to tax bank deposits held by Greeks in the country, stating that "in the coming days I will sign the agreement” [which is the same as the one signed with the Germans and Britons].

Moreover, the minister revealed that all debtors of over 1 million euros have been notified and the deadline to resolve outstanding issues ends on Friday.

Furthermore, Mr. Venizelos said that as regards individual borrowers, "the Privacy Authority has strict criteria for the disclosure of their names ... this is mostly why I wanted to notify them in person. That's why we voted for a group alarm device which also took place on November 18. 8 days must elapse, that is to say until Friday. Then conditions can be created for publicizing their names”.