“Chancellor Angela Merkel won a parliamentary vote on Greek aid after warning German lawmakers that pushing Greece out of the euro would risk “incalculable” damage, defying a public backlash against more bailout funds.
In a ballot that showed dissent in her coalition growing, 496 members of the lower house, or Bundestag, backed the 130 billion-euro ($174 billion) package yesterday in Berlin; 90 voted against and five abstained. While questions on Greece’s remaining in the euro “have their justification,” Merkel warned that a failure of the euro might endanger the European Union and the global economy.
“Angela Merkel’s strident insistence that bailing out Greece is vastly preferable to the alternative was important,” Kit Juckes, head of foreign-exchange research at Societe Generale SA, said in a note today as he forecast the euro rising to $1.50. “Europe’s leaders have always stepped back from the edge of the abyss after flirting with disaster.”
Merkel’s government pushed through the measure to stave off a collapse of the Greek economy amid signs of growing resistance and as one of her Cabinet ministers said Greece should leave the single currency. Euro leaders will now shift their focus on whether to bolster the region’s bailout firewall as they prepare for a summit meeting in Brussels on March 1-2….”
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