On the other hand, refusing to accept the growing consensus that fiscal union is the key to resolving the debt crisis exposes the eurozone, and Germany, to serious risks. Sticking to half-measures exacerbates markets’ impatience and provokes increasingly determined speculative attacks, not only on the weaker peripheral countries, but also on core AAA-rated countries – like France and, eventually, Germany itself – whose banking sectors hold large volumes of peripheral countries’ debt.