Greece Offers Debt-swap Plan In Bid To End Standoff: FT

Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis on Monday unveiled proposals, including swapping Greek debt for new bonds linked to economic growth, in a bid to end a eurozone debt standoff, the Financial Times reported. Varoufakis said the new Greek government would no longer call on creditors to write off part of Greece's 315 billion euros in foreign debt, but would instead ask for a "menu of debt swaps" to ease the burden, including two types of new bonds, the report said. The first type would be indexed to nominal economic growth and would replace European rescue loans; the second type would be "perpetual bonds" that would replace Greek bonds owned by the European Central Bank. The proposals are a form of "smart debt engineering," Varoufakis said, which would avoid terms such as debt "haircut" that are seen as politically unacceptable in Germany and other creditor countries, the report said.