2000s European sovereign debt crisis timeline

From late 2009, fears of a sovereign debt crisis in some European states developed, with the situation becoming particularly tense in early 2010.Greece was most acutely affected, but fellow Eurozone members Cyprus, Ireland, Portugal, and Spain were also significantly affected. In the EU, especially in countries where sovereign debt has increased sharply due to bank bailouts, a crisis of confidence has emerged with the widening of bond yield spreads and risk insurance on credit default swaps between these countries and other EU members, most importantly Germany.

This was the first Eurozone crisis since its creation in 1999. As Samuel Brittan pointed out, Jason Manolopoulos "shows conclusively that the Eurozone is far from an optimum currency area".Niall Ferguson also wrote in 2010 that "the sovereign debt crisis that is unfolding... is a fiscal crisis of the western world". Axel Merk argued in a May 2011 Financial Times article that the dollar was in graver danger than the euro.

Concern about rising government deficits and debt levels across the globe together with a wave of downgrading of European government debt created alarm in financial markets. The debt crisis is mostly centred on events in Greece, where the cost of financing government debt has risen. On 2 May 2010, the Eurozone countries and the International Monetary Fund agreed to a €110 billion loan for Greece, conditional on the implementation of harsh austerity measures. On 9 May 2010, Europe's Finance Ministers approved a comprehensive rescue package worth €750 billion (then almost a trillion dollars) aimed at ensuring financial stability across Europe by creating the European Financial Stability Facility. The Greek bail-out was followed by a €85 billion rescue package for Ireland in November, and a €78 billion bail-out for Portugal in May 2011.

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