Belgian Bail Out

[Vaevictus]

Belgium is an interesting one.

The government are already up to their eyeballs in debt. I think national debt is equal to 100%, maybe more, of GDP

A huge amount of tax revenue is dependent on people buying property. The taxes are immense, and makes buying a property extremely expensive. The transaction costs in Belgium are amongst the highest in the world. Weakness in the property market has no doubt had a big impact on their deficit.

Taxing the population more in other areas to make up for this is going to be difficult.

VAT is already at 21%, not much room for increase there.

Income tax is ridiculously high too so again not much room there.

Fuel, factoring in the strong euro to the pound, is already as expensive as is here. Their road tax is also double of ours.

Because the nation is so split politically, any austerity measures will be near impossible to implement without causing significant social unrest.

The only saving grace for Belgium it is that most people take fixes on their mortgages for the entire duration of the mortgage so a lot of people are pretty much immune to interest rate rises.

[copydude]

Belgium is an interesting one.

The taxes are immense, and makes buying a property extremely expensive. The transaction costs in Belgium are amongst the highest in the world. Weakness in the property market has no doubt had a big impact on their deficit.

Taxing the population more in other areas to make up for this is going to be difficult.

Yes. I stand to be corrected, but I believe Belgium is the only country where there is VAT on houses. There's also VAT on used cars and many other items where no value has been added whatsoever.

I believe Belgium's big problem came with the two banks it had to bail - Fortis and someone else - who got their fingers burned like RBS with the ABN AMRO purchase.

[non frog]

.....I believe Belgium's big problem came with the two banks it had to bail - Fortis and someone else - who got their fingers burned like RBS with the ABN AMRO purchase.

My missus has a Fortis account (Lux). They became BGL (General Bank of Luxembourg) and are now BNP Paribas. All that in 6 months.

[copydude]

My missus has a Fortis account (Lux). They became BGL (General Bank of Luxembourg) and are now BNP Paribas. All that in 6 months.

Too funny.

Try to get a bank card anywhere if you've changed your address in the last three years, let alone three times in the last six months!

'Oh monsieur, we 'as to be careful about ze fraude and ze monnaie laundrette'

But banks can do a runner any day of the week!

Anyway, to answer Interestrateripoff, Belgium is on the list of countries to get a hit, simply because it stupidly bought bits of ABN AMRO, thinking that 'le loan book est fundamentalement sound'

Like Ireland, Spain and Portugal, the Netherlands (with ABN AMRO) was lending well over 100% of its GDP. Knowing this was stoopid, they dumped it on to Belgium at the height of the boom.

But you can still say it is all contained, 'cause it's still in the Benelux after all.

[THE BALD MAN]

Eventually it looks as if China is going to be on the hook to bail-out the eu.

So what's needed is an anagram of all the eu members.

+1 We have bought shipd load of crap financed by mortgages on our over priced houses now we will need them to bail us out.

[IBlewItLastTime]

The UK is OK because it can simply devalue.

But France is a problem.

Hence its FIBS PIG

[copydude]

Coincidentally, an article today suggesting that Belgium has the most to lose from the failure of an Irish bail out.

Will Ireland Default? Ask Belgium

Look at loans outstanding relative to the size of their domestic economies (using the data from the Bank for International Settlements on what it calls “ultimate risk basis”).

The eye-catching numbers are for Belgium, which is owed $29 billion. In the relatively small Belgian economy, this accounts for around 5 percent of G.D.P.

Moreover, Belgium is already on the hook, according to the Bank for International Settlements, for 18.3 percent of its G.D.P. as a result of “general government contingent liabilities arising from ‘crisis assistance’ to financial institutions” The last thing it – or the rest of the euro-zone – needs is a fiscal crisis arising from commitments to support its banks after an Irish default.

Belgium’s overall fiscal picture is not good, its political stability is far from assured and its underlying social fissures would surely not be helped by a further dose of severe austerity.