Economist Nouriel Roubini interviewed by the Indian TV ET Now this 11 January 2012
Nouriel Roubini : The economic and financial conditions of the Eurozone are very severe. Germany and France cannot impose their will on all the other countries because the decision of the Eurozone had been taken by consensus. The trouble with the Eurozone right now is that you have severe stock imbalances, large stocks of public debt, liabilities of their financial system and flow problems.
There has been the loss of competitiveness at the periphery of the Eurozone. There are large external imbalances and all the policies that the Europeans are pursuing right now, fiscal austerity are going to make the recession in the Eurozone worse.
Not just Greece, but a number of other countries over the next couple of years will have to restructure their public debt and private ones in a coercive way. I also expect that one or more members of the Eurozone will eventually exit the Eurozone.
If it is a small Greece exiting, that can be managed. If eventually it were an Italy or Spain having to exit, that would effectively be a break up of the Eurozone. So of all the sources of systemic risk in the global economy, certainly the problems of the Eurozone are the most severe.
