News from Greece sees slump on European stock exchange

The leading European stock indexes declined sharply on Tuesday due to
a sharp crisis of sovereign debts in European countries, resulting in
a falling credit rating of Greece, RIA Novosti reports.

The indicators of British FTSE 100 fell by 2.61% by the closing – to
6159.51 points. German DAX dropped by 2.73% - to 6159.51 points. The
French indicator of CAC lost 3.82% - to 3844.60 points. The last large
fall on stock markets happened at the end of 2009 due to the
prolongation of a debt payout of Dubai World.

Standard & Poor’s lowered the long-term credit rating of Greece from
‘BBB+’ to ‘BB+’ with a negative forecast.

The rating of Greek short-term credit was lowered from ‘A-2’ to ‘B’.
This puts Greece below the investment level. The Bank of Greece
reported on Tuesday that the Greek economy may shrink by 2% this year.

Greece's partners in Europe plan to hold a summit on May 10 to reach
an agreement with Athens on investing 30 billion euros as subsidized
loans, France Press reports.

The Greek Finance Minister Giorgos Papakonstantinou requested earlier
on Tuesday a fast agreement on helping Athens. He said that Greece is
no longer capable of attracting finances and needs help from the EU
and the International Monetary Fund by May 19. It needs to refinance
8.5 billion euros of debt.

The head of the European Central Bank Jean-Claude Trichet expressed
his fears about the possible expansion of the Greek finance crisis to
other countries at a meeting in Chicago.
S&P lowered Portugal’s long-term credit rating from ‘A+’ to ‘A-‘ with
a negative forecast.

It’s short-term credit rating was lowered from ‘A-1’ to ‘A-2’.
Portugal’s state debt of 2009 totals 75% of GDP, which is lower than
Greece’s by 120%. However, analysts say that the threat comes from the
private sector.