Chronicle of a depression foretold, ch. LXVI

Greece's financial debacle is so last week. Ciao, Italia!

Unless the European Central Bank steps in, Italy will be shut out of the bond market very quickly. It will be unable to roll over its debt, and default will follow. This is basically Greece on steroids, since Italy is something like six times bigger than Greece. The eurozone deal announced a couple of weeks ago might have been big enough to handle a Greek collapse — though even that's not a sure thing — but it's not even close to being big enough to handle an Italian collapse.

Berlusconi's announced resignation, which ordinarily would be great news, now looks more like a particularly sleek, plump rat making its orderly way down the gangplank as the ship sinks behind him.