欧债沉疴还需猛药

    面对欧洲经济血如泉涌的伤口，欧洲领导人们依然只是贴上薄薄的创可贴了事，继续回避拯救欧元必须做出的艰难决定。上周五，欧债危机两年多来的第十九次“紧急”欧盟峰会落下了帷幕，拿出的依然只是些权宜之计和空口承诺。峰会对如何解决危机背后的结构性问题语焉不详（如果还有的话），各国领导人在这个问题上依然各持己见。

    如果这是第三或第四次峰会，拖延回避或许还无可厚非，但危机已持续两年多了，还这样就有些说不过去了。短期内或许市场会出现反弹，但不会回到正常水平，除非有确定的迹象显示，欧洲经济已回到正轨。

    上周五的峰会达成的决议主要围绕如何防止西班牙和（某种程度上）意大利陷入需要主权救助的地步，如果出现这样的情况，那将是灾难性的。人们相信只要这两个国家中的任何一个哪怕只是传出“违约”或“减债”的消息，欧元就可能崩溃，因为投资者的信心已经消失殆尽。为避免出现这样的结果，欧盟领导人对一些救助条款进行了大幅调整，虽然几个月前他们刚刚在此类“紧急”峰会中费尽周章地敲定了这些条款。

    最新峰会通过的第一项大的调整是，欧洲稳定机制（European Stability Mechanism）和欧洲金融稳定机制（European Financial Stability Facility）的资金将可用于救助陷入困境的欧元区银行。此举主要是为了帮助西班牙，这个国家的银行业已经陷入资金匮乏的窘境。过去，两大救助基金只能通过购买主权债券，为欧元区政府提供救助。此次调整后，西班牙政府将无需再代银行业借钱。

    此次峰会达成的第二项重大突破完全就是围绕西班牙。虽然德国很大程度上持保留态度，峰会同意救助基金发行的债券在还款次序上不先于西班牙主权债务。这意味着如果西班牙由于某种原因最终出现债务违约，西班牙债权人无需等到救助债券全部清偿后才能获得还款。这解决了还款先后问题。投资者们此前之所以回避西班牙债券、将其收益率推高至难以维持水平，还款先后问题也是一大原因。

    最后一项成果是与会国同意设立一个欧元区共同的银行监管机构，负责在整个欧洲大陆协调法律法规。目前，欧盟委员会正在筹划起草一份计划，建立一个庞大的银行监管机构，并希望于2013年底实施。峰会后发布的欧盟领导人声明称，新的泛欧盟银行业监管机构将“打破银行与主权国家间的恶性循环”。

    欧盟峰会消息发布后，上周五市场呈现反弹，周末也继续保持强劲态势。上周五，西班牙10年期国债收益率大跌62个基点至6.32%，意大利国债收益率下跌38个基点至5.81%。本周一早间，这样的收益率水平得以维持，令一些欧元怀疑论者开始动摇。

    European leaders continue to apply flimsy Band-Aids to their gushing economic wounds in an effort to avoid making the hard decisions necessary to save the euro from oblivion. The 19th "emergency" EU summit to be called since the European debt crisis began over two years ago concluded on Friday with yet another sputtering salvo of stop-gap measures and shaky promises. There was little, if any, talk of tackling the structural problems behind the crisis, with leaders still at odds over how they will philosophically go about solving the issue.

    Kicking the can down the road to buy some time may have sufficed at, say, the third or fourth summit, but doing so this deep in the crisis is simply inappropriate. While markets may rally in the short-term, they won't be back to normal until it is certain that Europe is on the right track.

    The resolutions reached at the conference Friday centered primarily on preventing Spain, and to a certain extent, Italy, from needing a potentially disastrous sovereign bailout. The belief was that if either of the two countries even whispered the words "default" or "haircut" then the euro could come crashing down as investor confidence dried up. To avoid such an outcome, EU leaders made a few sizable tweaks to some of the bailout rules they had just months ago painstakingly hashed out with one another at one of the various other "emergency" summits.

    The first big change agreed to at the conference was that the money from the big bailout funds, the European Stability Mechanism (ESM) and the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF), could now be used to bailout the eurozone's troubled banks. This change was primarily aimed at helping Spain as its banks have become starved for capital. Before this change, the funds were only authorized to bailout eurozone governments through the purchase of their sovereign debt. This therefore avoids the need for the Spanish government to borrow money on behalf of its banks.

    The second major breakthrough reached at the conference centered solely on Spain. With much reservation from Germany, it was agreed that the debt issued by the bailout funds would not be "subordinate" to Spain's sovereign debt. That means if Spain for some reason ends up defaulting on its debts, then Spanish bondholders wouldn't have to wait for the bailout bonds to be paid in full before they saw some relief. This cleared up the question of seniority in the payout structure, which was one of the big reasons why investors were shunning Spanish debt and driving up their yields to unsustainably high levels.

    Lastly, member states agreed that there should be a common bank supervisor for the Eurozone in order to harmonize rules and regulations across the continent. The European Commission is now planning a draft proposal for the a mega banking bureaucracy with a goal of implementation by the end of 2013. EU leaders noted in a statement released after the meeting that this new pan-EU banking supervision would "break the vicious circle between banks and sovereigns."

    The markets rallied Friday and continued strong through the weekend following news of the conference and its outcome. Spanish 10-year bond yields plunged 62 points on Friday to 6.32% while Italian yields fell 38 points to 5.81%. Those levels were holding in early Monday morning trading, which has made some euroskeptics question their positions.