The $400 billion ripoff that could destroy the Greek bailout

CNBC ^ | 24 November 2014 | Nasos Koukakis

[Toddsterpatriot]

People changing the law to make a quick buck should be praised and not criticized.

I'll be shocked if these investors make any money on their shares. Quick buck? LOL!

[Anitius Severinus Boethius]

These investors are probably the same people who hold much of the Greek debt. They will get paid on both ends. They will get money from the Greek government during repayment, they will be holding capital of the Greek people, and if the banks start to fail, they can rely on the IMF to bail them out... again.

[Toddsterpatriot]

These investors are probably the same people who hold much of the Greek debt.

It would suck to be them.

Banks have announced plans to shore up their capital before the end of the year, when legislation puts savers with more than 100,000 euros on the hook for losses. The plans include swap offers to creditors, described by Standard & Poor's as "distressed exchanges"

Greek Banks Ask Investors to Take Leap of Faith Amid Uncertainty

Distressed exchanges, ouch!! That's when current debt holders take it in the shorts.

They will get money from the Greek government during repayment

Yeah, they'll probably get a huge haircut.

they will be holding capital of the Greek people

What capital is that?

Bank shares lost almost 84 percent of their value since the beginning of the year, while the four biggest firms had combined net losses of about 4.6 billion euros in the first nine months.

Same link as above.

They just put $6.4 billion into banks that lost over $500 million a month this year.

[catnipman]

Ridiculous headline. Everything I’ve been reading about these banks for months is that they are massively insolvent due to owning massive amounts of worthless assets and basically should have been declared to be bankrupt.

Their stock was already trading at near-bankrupt prices anyway; Alpha Bank’s stock, for example was trading for 0.125 euros prior to the buyout.

Those banks are lucky anybody wanted them at all, and if I read this poorly written article correctly, the new owners injected new capital into the banks when they purchased them.

[achilles2000]

Too rational for this thread. The banks were almost certainly very insolvent, and some investors recapitalized them. The “analysis” on MSBC is childish.

[wiggen]

Actually its a shell game. Article says Greek tax payers but they’ve been taking EU money like crazy. Who can say exactly where the funds to bail them out came from over the past four or five years?