A future crisis-management mechanism – if, indeed, governments can agree on one at all – should retain some ambiguity as to how the insurance provided to member states will operate, focusing instead on procedures, in particular regarding creditors’ participation in sharing losses, and on the principle of IMF involvement in shaping loan conditionality. Leaving scope in this way for financial markets to impose discipline offers the best hope for maintaining individual countries’ primary responsibility for their non-monetary policies, which was central to the original vision for the euro.