Germany approves expanded powers for euro debt facility–now on to the hard work

By a vote of 523 in favor and 85 opposed the Bundestag approved a measure to enable the European Financial Stability Facility to buy troubled government bonds and to offer precautionary credit lines to banks. It also increased Germany’s guarantees for the facility to 211 billion euros from 123 billion. Enough parliamentary members from Chancellor Angela Merkel’s collation voted in favor to give her a so-called “chancellor’s majority.”

European stocks soar as today’s good news story fills the gap left by a rebuttal to yesterday’s good news

This morning the European Investment Bank went to some lengths to rebut yesterday’s story that had the bank at the center of a new European guarantee mechanism but Eurogroup President Jean-Claude Juncker told Reuters that he has been informed that representatives of the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank, and the European Union will return to Athens on Wednesday or Thursday.