Obama: World economy weak until eurozone woes solved

WASHINGTON — US President Barack Obama warned the world economy would remain weak until the eurozone crisis was solved, as market anxiety mounted over debt woes in Greece, Spain and Italy.

In a roundtable interview with Hispanic journalists, Obama said that the United States was working with European states and authorities to help craft packages for vulnerable economies.

“We will continue to see weaknesses in the world economy, I think, so long as this issue is not resolved,” Obama said.

“It will be a significant topic for the G20 meeting that takes place in November,” he said, referring to a meeting to be hosted by France.

Obama said that Washington was “deeply engaged” with European nations on solving the eurozone crisis but that ultimately large countries in Europe were going to have to come together to decide how to solve it.

“Greece is obviously the biggest immediate problem. And they’re taking some steps to slow the crisis but not solve the crisis,” Obama said.

“The bigger problem is what happens in Spain and Italy if the markets keep making a run at those very big countries,” he said.

Earlier on Monday, European stocks plunged and the euro slumped to a 10-year low against the yen as talk of a possible Greek default compounded worries that the world is set for another recession.

But US stocks bucked the trend, as the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.63 percent on a report in the Financial Times that China was in talks to buy Italian government bonds.

Greece — which earlier this year was given the green light for a second bailout — announced on Sunday two billion euros ($2.7 billion) in budget cuts demanded by the EU and the IMF for its rescue package to avoid a default.

EU Economy Commissioner Olli Rehn welcomed the move and said a team would head to Athens in the next few days to discuss a new tranche of Greece’s first rescue package agreed in 2010.

However, European finance ministers are split over how to deal with obstacles holding up the second 160-billion-euro bailout for Greece, agreed in principle in July.

And Germany’s Economy Minister Philipp Roesler pointedly said, in a column for publication on Monday, that Europe could no longer rule out an “orderly default” for Greece.