Major European banks – in the United Kingdom, Germany, and France – have, like their 1980’s predecessors, built up a gigantic exposure to what they erroneously thought was safe debt. A substantial immediate haircut on the sovereign debt of the vulnerable eurozone countries would be so destructive that it would set off a new round of bank panics.
欧洲各大银行，不论是英国的、德国的还是法国的，就像20世纪80年代它们的前辈一样，错把国债当成安全债权，累积了巨大的头寸。如果立即对脆弱的欧元区国家的主权债进行大规模减记，可能引发新一轮银行业大恐慌，其后果不堪设想。恰恰是看准了这一点，那些银行便可以向它们的政府勒索赎金。这才是此次危机给英国、德国和法国提出来的棘手问题。