Greece: "Where did all the money go?"
From MacroPolis:
The total amount of loans the eurozone and the International Monetary Fund supplied to Greece between May 2010 and the most recent disbursements last summer stand at 226.7 billion euros. This is equivalent to almost 125 percent of Greece's economic activity in 2014.
The first programme was worth 73 billion euros, 52.9 billion of which came in the form of bilateral loans from eurozone members states. Another 20.1 billion euros was provided by the IMF.
The loans from the second programme agreed in March 2012 currently stand at 153.7 billion euros. The eurozone’s part is broadly completed as the EFSF has disbursed 141.8 billion with one last tranche of 1.8 billion remaining. The IMF has provided 11.8 billion of financing to date, with its involvement due to run to February 2016.
The combined eurozone involvement in Greece comes to 194.8 billion euros (107 percent of GDP), while the IMF total stands at 31.9 billions (18 percent of GDP).
These are staggering figures: No other nation has received this volume of loans in a period of 4.5 years.
From European Commission review documents, IMF evaluation reports, Finance Ministry budget documents and Hellenic Statistical Authority (ELSTAT) publications we pieced together roughly which financing holes this approximately quarter of a trillion euros closed.
Greece covered some of its financing needs during the period in question via a number of its own sources. The issuance of a 3- and a 5-year bonds in 2014 of 3 and 1.5 billion euros respectively, the increase of the stock of T-bills by 10 billion euros, the use of cash reserves of government bodies via repos worth 7 billion and privatization proceeds in the range of 2.4 billion, provided a total of 24 billion euros of own financing.
There seems to be a general misconception that feeds a misleading narrative in which the loans were used to keep the Greek state afloat, maintain its basic operations and pay salaries of doctors, teachers and policemen. Only last week Spanish Finance Minister Luis de Guindos made claims along these lines....MORE
