Summary

Prime Minister Alex Tsipras is heralding a new deal with Greece’s European creditors. The deal extends maturation dates by 10 years and makes it so the government won’t need to start paying back its $281 billion in bailout funding until 2032. It also provides around $17.5 billion in new funding for the government, which is projecting a 3.8% budget surplus after years of fire sales of state assets, economic contraction, and painful austerity policies. Indeed, Tsipras is so pleased with the deal that he’s now decided to start wearing ties – something he pledged he wouldn’t do until Greece’s creditors agreed to renegotiate the country’s debt to set it on a more sustainable long-term course.

But can this maturation delay really be considered the haircut that Tsipras wanted? Or is the European Stability Mechanism (ESM) merely kicking the can down the road for future leaders to deal with?