Greece Expects to Receive $3.14-Bln Tranche From EU on October 10 – Source

Athens expects the second tranche of international financial aid to Greece to be approved at the Eurogroup's meeting on Monday, after the country fulfilled all 15 conditions of the creditors necessary for the transfer of the 2.8 billion euro (about $3.2 billion), a source in the Finance Ministry told reporters on Sunday.

ATHENS (Sputnik) — On September 27, the Greek Parliament approved a reform bill, stipulating a number of social welfare cuts and privatizations demanded by EU and International Monetary Fund (IMF) creditors. The bill will proceed for an evaluation by a Eurogroup working group, which will then present its recommendations to EU finance ministers.

“The overall picture is that the [Greek] government’s strategy to fulfill conditions [to receive next bailout tranche] has produced positive results, though with a little delay, and we expect that things will go well on Monday as we are done with [implementing] conditions,” the source said.

In May, Eurogroup finance ministers held marathon talks on new loans for debt-ridden Greece, finally agreeing on a 10.3 billion-euro ($11.5 billion) aid package, which is part of the 86 billion-euro package. In June, the European Stability Mechanism (ESM) disbursed about 7.5 billion euros to Greece. Greece was told to fulfill 15 conditions in order to get remaining $3.14 billion.

The Greek debt crisis erupted in 2010 with a number of austerity packages adopted by the parliament and several bailout payments provided by the European Commission, the European Central Bank (ECB) and the IMF. The loans, however, only resulted in increasing country’s debt.