PARIS, Oct 13 (Reuters) – France believes the euro zone’s
EFSF rescue fund should be turned into a bank to leverage its
firepower and Greek bondholders will have to accept losses
higher than 21 percent, a finance ministry source said on
Thursday.

“We think that obviously the most solid way (of leveraging
the EFSF) is for the fund to become a bank so that, in
collaboration with the ECB, it could leverage itself,” said the
source.

PARIS, Oct 12 (Reuters) – France will use public money to
recapitalise its banks if needed and will not have to fall back
on the euro zone’s EFSF rescue fund, government spokeswoman
Valerie Pecresse said on Wednesday.

Pecresse, France’s budget minister, said the government
would only use public money if banks that were revealed to have
a capital shortfall were not able to raise the cash themselves
from private investors.

PARIS (Reuters) – G20 finance ministers will press Europe this week to find an urgent solution to its debt crisis, with a row between Washington and Beijing over the yuan threatening efforts to address broader global imbalances.

An economic slowdown and market slump has been met with discord within the Group of 20 rich and developing economies that makes up 85 percent of global output, a stark contrast to 2009 when the group launched a coordinated stimulus to pull the world economy back from the brink.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Europe is working on ways to boost the firepower of its bailout fund, a top European official said as the United States, China and other countries turned up pressure on the euro zone to contain its debt crisis.

Signs are growing that Europe is readying new measures to prevent fallout from Greece’s near-bankruptcy from spreading to other euro zone countries, threatening the region’s banks and hurting the world economy.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Europe is working on ways to boost the firepower of its bailout fund, a top European official said as the United States, China and other countries turned up pressure on the euro zone to contain its debt crisis.

Signs are growing that Europe is readying new measures to prevent fallout from Greece’s near-bankruptcy from spreading to other euro zone countries, threatening the region’s banks and hurting the world economy.

WASHINGTON, Sept 23 (Reuters) – Microsoft founder Bill
Gates on Friday backed a controversial financial transactions
tax to aid development in poor countries but France
acknowledged that most G20 countries did not like the idea.

The Gates Foundation was tasked by French President Nicolas
Sarkozy to examine ways the Group of 20 leading economies could
raise new money for the world’s poor, including plugging an
estimated $80 billion to $100 billion funding gap to tackle
climate change.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The world’s major economies on Thursday pledged to prevent Europe’s debt crisis from undermining banks and financial markets, and said the euro zone’s rescue fund could be bolstered.

Under pressure from investors to show action, finance ministers and central bankers from the Group of 20 economies said they would take all steps needed to calm the global financial system.

By Daniel Flynn and Jean-Baptiste Vey

(Reuters) – A French banking system shaken by a crisis of confidence and hobbled by the need to deleverage and write down assets could choke off credit to consumers and businesses and shatter France’s fragile recovery.

France’s economy was already stuttering, with zero growth in the second quarter, before alarm over its banks’ exposure to Greece and their reliance on short-term wholesale funding battered banking sector share prices and jolted global markets.

By Daniel Flynn and Jean-Baptiste Vey

(Reuters) – A French banking system shaken by a crisis of confidence and hobbled by the need to deleverage and write down assets could choke off credit to consumers and businesses and shatter France’s fragile recovery.

France’s economy was already stuttering, with zero growth in the second quarter, before alarm over its banks’ exposure to Greece and their reliance on short-term wholesale funding battered banking sector share prices and jolted global markets.

MADRID/PARIS, Sept 15 (Reuters) – Spain and France sold
nearly all the bonds they had offered at auctions on Thursday
although the sales proved that investors still want a premium
for all but the safest euro zone debt.

Spain’s Treasury sold almost 4 billion euros ($5.47
billion) of three bonds and, while rates hovered close to
nine-year highs investors were more enthusiastic than when Italy
visited the market on Tuesday.