NEWS,18.06.2012

Greek leaders seek coalition, want to ease bailout

Greece's conservative leader has pushed for a new coalition government after a narrow election victory, pledging to soften the debt-laden country's punishing austerity programe despite opposition from Germany.A brief relief rally on international financial markets after Sunday's Greek vote quickly fizzled out as it became clear that Antonis Samaras's New Democracy had failed to win a convincing popular mandate to implement the deep spending cuts and tax increases demanded by the European Union and the IMF.Radical left-wing bloc SYRIZA and a host of smaller parties opposed to the punishing conditions attached to the $206 billion bailout won around half the votes cast, though fewer seats because the electoral system rewards the first placed party disproportionately.Samaras received a mandate to form a coalition government from the president today, but talks looked set to run into at least tomorrow. He said the country would meet its commitments under a bailout saving the country from bankruptcy and a dramatic exit from the euro zone.But Samaras added: "We will simultaneously have to make some necessary amendments to the bailout agreement, in order to relieve the people of crippling unemployment and huge hardships."Samaras met with SYRIZA's charismatic leader Alexis Tsipras, who ruled out joining the government, and with the third-placed PASOK Socialists, who did not commit. PASOK leader Evangelos Venizelos said negotiations "must be wrapped up" on Tuesday.The small Democratic Left party indicated it would be ready to support Samaras if the bailout deal could be softened.Greece's economy is forecast to contract 5% this year after shrinking 7% last year. Protests regularly choke the centre of Athens, some hospitals are running short of medicines, thousands of businesses have closed and beggars and rough sleepers are multiplying.During the election campaign, Samaras called for cuts in taxes, hikes in unemployment benefits, pension rises and two more years to meet fiscal targets.But Germany, already irritated at what it sees as the slow pace of Greek reform, ruled out more than minor delays to some targets in the rescue package - Greece's second since 2010.Chancellor Angela Merkel, speaking at a meeting of G20 leaders in Mexico, said any loosening of Greece's agreed reform pledges would be unacceptable and reiterated that Athens had to stick to the commitments it had already made.Germany says deal "not negotiable" Samaras voted in 2010 against the first $174 billion rescue because he thought it was too harsh. He now said Greece should have until 2016, not 2014, to meet fiscal targets set by under the bailout. Venizelos wants a further year to reform.German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said the substance of the bailout agreement was "not negotiable", but he said creditors might be willing to offer some flexibility on timing for some of the targets, given the time lost in campaigning."We're ready to talk about the time frame as we can't ignore the lost weeks, and we don't want people to suffer because of that," he told German radio today.There was frustration in Berlin that Samaras had campaigned on a promise to renegotiate the bailout, given the scale of resistance among those stumping up the cash.European Central Bank Executive Board member Joerg Asmussen warned that extending the 2014 deadline for Greece to cut its budget deficit to below three percent of GDP would mean fresh money for Athens."I can only generally point out that if one is pressing to shift fiscal targets, one should be so honest to also say that as long as a country is running a primary deficit, extending the fiscal targets will automatically mean that there will be an additional external financing need," Asmussen said.With an emboldened SYRIZA bloc led by former communist student leader Tsipras at the head of a powerful opposition, the new government could face protests soon after taking office. SYRIZA almost doubled its share of the vote since a previous election on May 6, which produced stalemate.

US and EU haggle over trade barriers

The United States and the European Union, stung by past failures to liberalize trade, are struggling over how to tackle regulatory barriers in areas ranging from financial services to chemicals that pose the biggest obstacle to a transatlantic free trade pact.A joint US-EU working group is due to deliver interim recommendations this month on how to leverage one of the world's largest trade relationships to create more jobs on both sides of the Atlantic and bolster economic growth.Businesses both in the United States and Europe want Washington and Brussels to strike a deal that removes trade hurdles by requiring both to accept each other's consumer- and environmental-protection standards.They envision an agreement in which a car tested for safety in the United States would not have to be tested again in Europe, or a drug deemed safe by Brussels would not have to be approved by US government experts.There's a good chance the upcoming report from the team led by US Trade Representative Ron Kirk and European Union Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht will be no more than a "stock-taking" of the talks so far, with the real meat of the recommendations in a final report near the end of the year.Peter Rashish, vice president for Europe and Eurasia at the US Chamber of Commerce, said he hopes for a forward-leaning document that sets the stage for ambitious talks that would begin when the final report is put out."We need a strong statement that a US-EU trade deal would be a big boost to jobs and growth, given the challenges both the US and the EU economy face right now," Rashish said.The United States and the EU have proven records of sealing bilateral free trade agreements, including deals each has struck with South Korea that some have suggested be used a template for a transatlantic pact.Also, tariffs on manufactured goods traded between the two economic blocs are generally low, and there are few sectors where dismantling the remaining tariffs would create political opposition to a pact. That has raised hopes a deal to eliminate the remaining duties could be struck quickly once talks begin.Drag on for years Even so, US and EU officials worry about launching negotiations that could drag on for years without success, such as the Doha round of world trade talks, which started in 2001 and never reached an agreement.A joint effort late in the administration of former President George W. Bush to eliminate European barriers to US poultry exports flopped so badly that the United States in frustration filed a case against the EU at the World Trade Organization."What you've got is a deep-seated suspicion on each side that the other side can't deliver," said Bill Reinsch, president of the National Foreign Trade Council, which represents major US exporters like Boeing, Caterpillar and Microsoft.Reinsch noted that the United States has disappointed the EU in recent talks on allowing foreign firms to bid on more US state and local government contracts."So there's this extensive poking around to figure what can be delivered," Reinsch said.Recent consultations have driven home how difficult it could be to address regulatory differences that impede trade in areas from food to chemicals to financial services, although both sides see a potentially big payoff from achieving that."What is really bothering companies on both sides of the Atlantic right now is not so much tariffs, but the duplication of regulatory requirements," a European official said.Those are harder to tackle because they involve regulators such as the US Food and Drug Administration, the European Medicines Agency and the European Food Safety Authority that are outside the purview of typical trade agreements."I think the regulatory piece is certainly the most challenging and I think we have to agree on what success would look like on regulatory matters" within the 18 to 24 months both sides hope it will take to reach a deal, Rashish said.That would probably require a recognition that some issues will still need further work after an initial free trade agreement is signed, he said.The US Chamber of Commerce has proposed starting with areas, such as autos, chemicals and pharmaceuticals, where the two sides have comparable, high-level standards to protect consumers and the environment but different specific requirements for The idea would be that after determining that US and EU regulatory regimes produce similar levels of protection, agreements would be reached to recognize each other's requirements in those areas as essentially equivalent, thereby removing them as barriers to trade, and setting a foundation for moving into additional areas, Rashish said.

NEWS,16.06.2012

Greece election 'euro versus drachma'

 

Conservative leader Antonis Samaras has told Greeks they face a stark choice between staying in the euro or a "nightmare" return to the drachma in an election that threatens to send shockwaves through the single currency.Samaras's New Democracy party is neck and neck with the radical leftist SYRIZA going into Sunday's pivotal vote, with SYRIZA leader Alexis Tsipras threatening to tear up the punishing terms of the 130 billion euro bailout that is keeping Greece from bankruptcy.Addressing supporters at his final campaign rally, Samaras pledged again to renegotiate the bailout's punishing terms in order to promote growth and jobs, but said that to go head to head with the country's European partners would mean the end of Greece's euro membership."We are going into an election to decide the future of Greece and of our children," Samaras, 61, told the crowd of several thousand waving Greek and EU flags in the capital's central Syntagma square."The first choice the Greek people must make is: euro versus drachma.""There are some outside Greece who want the country to be the black sheep and push it out of the euro. We will not please them," Samaras said, in a speech laced with the anti-immigrant rhetoric on the rise in Greece as the economy flounders.Neither party is expected to win outright, and negotiations will follow to create a pro- or anti-bailout coalition government.Nightmare Euro zone officials have hinted they might give a new Greek government some leeway on how it reaches debt targets set by the EU/IMF bailout package, but there would be no change to the targets themselves.Greece's lenders say they will turn off the taps if the country rejects the bailout. Tsipras says Europe is bluffing - it cannot afford to cut Greece loose and risk the contagion for the much larger economies of Spain and Italy, he argues.Greeks say overwhelmingly that they do not want to leave the euro, but neither do they want the pension, job and wage cuts arising from the bailout which have helped condemn the country to five years of record-breaking recession."I'm optimistic because I hope people will think as Greeks when they vote and not give in to anger," 61-year-old pensioner Anthi Zoitou said during Friday's rally."I voted for another party ... in the previous election," said 32-year-old economist Antonis Kargas, "but will vote for New Democracy now. The dilemma facing Greece is whether it holds onto its European prospects."Sunday's vote is a re-run of a May 6 election that produced stalemate.Tsipras has rejected forming a government of national unity, but Samaras said the country could not afford a third election."We cannot withstand it," he said. "We are in favour of renegotiating (the bailout) for jobs and to remain in the euro; this is what the Greek people want.""Should young people have opportunities to work or will we allow today's incredible unemployment to become a nightmare?"

Investors seek shelter before Greek vote

Traders and investors are taking all bets off the table before this weekend’s Greek elections, which may decide whether Athens stays in the eurozone. Greece votes on Sunday in a second attempt to choose a government that will decide whether to back the terms of its international bailout. G20 officials say central banks are ready to act to calm markets if needed. But investors are not taking any chances. “People are just totally hands off, they don’t want to know. Why would anyone want to deal this side of the weekend?” said Steve Larkins, head of sales trading at Seymour Pierce. “With the Greek elections coming up, Monday morning could be a disaster for someone taking a big bet over the weekend.” Hedge funds, typically among the most aggressive market players, are also wary, taking on only 10%-30% of their maximum permitted bets on risky assets, said Gerry Fowler, global head of equity and derivative strategy at BNP Paribas. “There are so many risks that just can’t be modelled... it really creates a market where no one can do anything with conviction and it’s a matter of wait and see,” he said. Global fund managers’ cash balances have jumped to 5.3% this month, their third-highest level on record, according to a Bank of America Merrill Lynch survey. Equities investors have been reluctant to roll over, or replace, options contracts which expire on Friday, as they opt for neutral positions. Some 1.4 million futures contracts on Euro STOXX 50 index of eurozone blue chips are yet to be rolled over, according to Eurex data. Shake out The shaking out of positions has led to high volumes. Monday was the Euro STOXX 50 index’s most active day of 2012 and this has been one of the year’s most active weeks. In currency markets, the euro has rallied versus the dollar  - arguably a counter-intuitive move given the eurozone crisis. Traders say the rebound has been driven by investors’ desire to unwind the large number of net short bets built up in the single currency. “As far as the euro/dollar is concerned, I am going square into the Greek elections. I have a feeling, either way, things will drag on for a while and that gives us enough reaction time,” Stuart Frost, head of Absolute Returns and Currency at fund manager RWC Partners. Position squaring was a factors behind a selloff this week in safe haven German government debt, which had been a favourite place for investors to sit out the crisis, even if that meant paying Berlin for the privilege. “Positioning is pretty square,” said one London-based bond trader. “People might still be a little bit long in longer-dated bonds but that’s probably because they haven’t been able to get out... A lot of bets have come off the table.” Another trader said the moves in the Bund futures signalled “that a lot of desks are either taking less risks themselves or have been told (to) stop taking risk until after the election”. Most sellers of insurance against a default on Greek government debt, known as credit default swaps (CDS), declined to quote before the weekend, dealers said. “I’d be surprised if anyone would want to dive in before the election with (Greek) bonds trading at 10 cents on the euro. "If we get some stability with the election then we’d expect trading to pick up again,” said one head of European credit trading at a major US bank. Ready for rollercoaster Investor nervousness is evident in the big gap between actual volatility on the Euro STOXX 50, which has fallen to two-month lows below 20, and the implied volatility as measured by the VSTOXX which has stayed stubbornly high around 32. “The spread between realised and implied volatility has gone up in a way that would explain the market is pricing in some Greek weekend risk,” said Abhinandan Deb, European head of equity derivatives research at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Implied volatility reflects options pricing and is a measure of expected price swings. In the currency market, one-week implied volatilities have jumped to around 15.40%, the highest in six months and almost double the level of realised volatility. “Expect a rollercoaster in the markets,” said Stefan Angele, head of investment management, Swiss & Global Asset Management, although he advised keeping some positions, such as an "underweight" stance on the financial sector. With so much nervousness and so much money off the table, the markets could be poised for wild swings come Monday morning. “There is a gigantic number of shorts in euro/dollar so any headline that comes out over the weekend that indicates that Europe is safe will create the scope for a massive squeeze up on Monday,” said Jeremy Batstone-Carr, director of private client research investment strategy at Charles Stanley.

NEWS, 30.05.2012.

IMF chief riles Greeks

 

Political leaders in Athens and thousands of internet users have rounded on International Monetary Fund (IMF) chief Christine Lagarde for branding Greeks tax dodgers, as parties went on the campaign trail for next month's elections.Socialist leader Evangelos Venizelos accused Lagarde on Sunday of trying to "humiliate" the debt-stricken country, which is facing its second election in six weeks, a vote seen as crucial to the future of the eurozone.Radical left-wing leader Alexis Tsipras, whose Syriza party is one of the two top contenders for the June 17 vote, insisted "Greek workers pay their taxes, which are unbearable".Greek web users waged Facebook war against Lagarde, with the IMF's French managing director receiving more than 10 000 messages, many of them obscene, on her page on the online social network.By late Sunday afternoon a separate Facebook page had sprung up titled "Greeks are against Lagarde".Their anger was sparked by comments Lagarde made in Britain's Guardian newspaper on Friday that Greeks must "help themselves collectively" by all paying taxes, saying she was more concerned about Africans in poverty than Greeks in the economic crisis.Among the online messages posted by angry Greeks, Iakovos Magdakis wrote: "Who are you to tell me to pay? My wife has been unemployed for four years, I have been unemployed for five months and we have a four-month-old baby."Lagarde responded to the flood of angry online messages by responding on Facebook that she was "very sympathetic to the Greek people and the challenges they are facing"."That's why the IMF is supporting Greece in its endeavour to overcome the current crisis," she said on the social networking site.The comments by the French IMF head came as parties squared off for the election that could determine whether Greece continues to receive European Union-IMF funds as part of a multi-billion euro bailout package and stays in the eurozone.Tsipras seized on her comments to assert his stance as a defender against economic cuts, which drove many Greeks to vote for him in an inconclusive election on May 6, putting him second ahead of Venizelos's Pasok party."The last thing we seek in Greece is her sympathy. Greek workers pay their taxes, which are unbearable," Tsipras said in a statement, taking a swipe at Pasok and the conservative New Democracy party which came first in May."For tax evaders, she should turn to Pasok and New Democracy to explain to her why they haven't touched the big money and have been chasing the simple worker for two years."In France, whose Socialist President Francois Hollande has defended Greece's place in the eurozone and pushed for a more growth-orientated strategy in the crisis, government spokesperson Najat Vallaud-Belkacem described Lagarde's comments as "rather simplistic and stereotypical".Venizelos welcomed Lagarde's Facebook message, after saying an election rally: "Nobody can humiliate the Greek people during the crisis."Greece made a deal in 2010 to receive hundreds of billions of euros from the IMF and the EFSF, a European Union bailout fund, to rescue it from financial collapse. Lagarde took the reins of the global lender in May 2011.The country will head to the polls for a second time in six weeks on June 17 since political parties failed to form a coalition after the May 6 election.Syriza, which has threatened to renege on the bailout accords, has led at times in the opinion polls, but a series of polls published Sunday indicated New Democracy had taken the lead.New Democracy and Pasok each defend the bailout agreement they signed as partners in a coalition government, but have proposed to amend it.Venizelos said he wants to extend the loan repayments."The country needs a government that will unite the people and revise the loan agreement, but assure we stay in the euro," he said Sunday.Former prime minister Lucas Papademos has warned that Greece may run out of money by the end of June if international bailout funds are cut off following the election, To Vima newspaper reported Sunday.Campaigning on Saturday, New Democracy leader Antonis Samaras said a victory for Syriza would cause "catastrophe" and send Greece out of the euro.

Greece's crime bonanza

 

Andreas and Emilia Karabalis, who are both 80, feared their bank in Greece would collapse, so they withdrew their €80 000 ($100 000) savings and stashed it at home for safety. Days later, the thieves came in the night. "We were sleeping. The two masked burglars came to our bed and tied us up. They hit us. "They robbed us - they didn't leave anything, it was torture," said Emilia, who still trembles when she recalls the attack this month on the island of Lefkada. Husband Andreas added: "Our life is black now. They took our life's savings. We lost everything." No one knows just how much cash lies stashed in Greek homes, secreted in cupboards, at the back of the ice-box, beneath the floor or under the mattress. But by any guess it is well in the billions, and burglars are after their share of loot which is both highly portable and virtually impossible to recover. Greece's debt crisis has plunged it into five straight years of economic contraction, thrown half of its young people out of work and may see it ejected from the eurozone. In the past two years, Greeks have withdrawn from banks more than €72bn - or close to €7 000 for every man, woman and child in the country. And much of that has been taken in cash. No money in robbing banks Police say that gangs who may have once eyed "hard targets", - like the banks themselves, or jewellers - are now going after homes of ordinary people, where there is far less risk and often large stashes of cash freshly withdrawn from savings accounts. "Many people have withdrawn their money from the banks fearing a financial crash, and they either carry it on them, find a hideout at home or in storage rooms," said national police spokesperson Thanassis Kokkalakis. "We urge people to trust the banking system, leave their money there, or at least in a safe place, not hide it at home, where they must anyway take the basic security measures," he said. "Some people don't even lock their doors and windows." The unexpected bonanza is attracting foreign crime networks, he said, including two from ex-Soviet Georgia which police dismantled in recent months, blaming them for 300 burglaries. Crime is just one hazard for people storing unusually large hoards of cash, most of which are not insured. There are tales of savings going up in smoke in fires or, as in one case, being lost when a pensioner withdrew his life savings - then died suddenly, before telling his family where they were hidden. Theft, though, seems the biggest risk and the crime wave has spread far beyond the big cities into rural areas where robbery was little known. Carpenter George Psychogios, 30, withdrew his savings of €8 000 and kept them in his house at Arta, a small town 350km from Athens and known principally for its Byzantine stone bridge and a 13th-century church. "I hid the money in two different places before leaving for a trip. When I came back it was all gone," he said. "They broke into the house through a balcony door and they took it all." "We used to sleep outside with the doors unlocked. Now we don't feel safe even when we lock up. They break into homes, shops, businesses. There is a surge in robberies here." In Iraklion, a working class neighbourhood of Athens, local people say some thieves have become so brazen that they often prowl in broad daylight, even when a family is in. "We were sitting on the front veranda chatting when they jumped from the roof to the back yard and got into the house," said pensioner Mattheos Michelakakis, 61. Before he realised what had happened, they had made off with his family's gold. "Burglars hear that people are scared and withdrawing money and they hit homes randomly hoping they will be lucky," he said. "I feel like I've been naive. We always used to leave all the doors open; we had nothing to worry about." Hoarding in troubled times According to the central bank, Greeks withdrew €72bn from bank accounts between January 2010 and March 2012, leaving just €165bn behind. Since then, withdrawals have accelerated further after an inconclusive May 6 election led Eurtopean Union leaders to talk openly of Greek exit from the single currency. Some of that money was wired abroad and some spent, but much of it was hidden in homes, either in cash or converted to gold. If Greece leaves the common currency area, any money left in Greek banks would probably be turned into drachmas worth a good deal less. Euros stashed in a box at home would still be euros. "People have already taken their money out of the bank. The rest are doing it now because they are afraid we will be kicked out of the eurozone," said one police officer. Among cases he said he had come across in the past week: a man reported €30 000 in cash and gold stolen from a storage room next to his house and an elderly woman had her life savings of €100 000 stolen from her apartment. That woman's home also happened to be packed full of cartons of long-life milk and boxes of pasta - in case, she explained, the economic crisis led to food shortages. Stashing cash is as old as Greece. The countryside is dotted with archaeological sites where the ancients squirrelled away their silver drachmas to hide them from marauding armies. Greek museums are rich in treasure whose owners never made it back. "Hiding valuables - small or larger amounts of coins, golden, silver, even bronze - was very widespread in antiquity, especially in times of war, crisis or difficulty," said George Riginos of the Association of Greek Archaeologists. "Sometimes the owner would perish and this is how they reached us, hidden in the ground, in holes in the wall, small vases under the floor or leather bags." Future archaeologists may yet stumble on some of the buried treasure of the eurozone crisis of 2012. A senior banker tells the story of a family on the island of Rhodes who recently visited their local branch, trying desperately to figure out how much their late father had withdrawn before he died. Not trusting the bank, the old man had taken out his life savings. But he hadn't told anyone where he hid it. His children were searching everywhere, tearing down walls in the house trying to find it, but with no luck.

NEWS,11.05.2012.

Greek parties scramble to avert new election

 

The leaders of Greece's once-dominant political parties make their final effort today to form a coalition and avert a new election, which a poll showed would all but wipe them out and give victory to a radical leftist who rejects an EU bailout.The overwhelming majority of Greeks want to stay in the euro zone but voted last Sunday for parties that reject the severe terms of a bailout negotiated last year.European leaders say Greece will be ejected from the common currency if it turns its back on the package of tax hikes and wage cuts.Socialist PASOK leader Evangelos Venizelos, whose party once towered over Greek politics but placed a distant third in the election, will be the last politician given a chance to form a Government.He was due to meet conservative rival Antonis Samaras, whose New Democracy party came first in the election, but who has already failed to form a coalition.If Venizelos fails as well, all parties will have one last chance to try before a new election must be held in the coming three to four weeks.PASOK and New Democracy jointly negotiated the 130 billion euro EU/IMF bailout in a reluctant coalition last year and now are the only parties in Parliament that support it.Enraged voters punished them by reducing their combined share of the vote from 77 % to 32 % at last Sunday's election, leaving them two seats short of forming a coalition Government.Samaras and Venizelos may be hoping Greeks, frightened by the prospect of hasty ejection from the euro, will return to the two traditional mainstream parties if the election is re-run next month.But a new poll showed the main beneficiary of a new vote would be the hardline Left Coalition SYRIZA, whose leader Alexis Tsipras rejects the bailout and has demanded it be torn up.The first opinion poll to be published since the election showed SYRIZA would win with 27.7% of the vote, almost 11 points up on their election result, consolidating votes that had been split among smaller anti-bailout groups.Under a rule designed to make it easier to form a Government, the party that places first gets 50 bonus seats in the 300 seat Parliament.Those seats went to New Democracy on Sunday. If SYRIZA were to win them in a new election, the marginalisation of the once-mighty parties would be complete and it would be impossible to form a Government supporting the bailout.Venizelos's hope of reaching a last-ditch deal have rested with the Democratic Left party, a small moderate splinter group.But its leader, Fotis Kouvelis, insisted on Friday he would not join a coalition with the pro-bailout parties unless anti-bailout parties were also included and the new government pulled out of the loan deal."Our proposal for an ecumenical government seeks to ensure the participation of all those forces that can serve two aims: the gradual disengagement from the loan agreement and staying in the euro zone", Kouvelis told Skai TV.One socialist party official said on Thursday there was a "very slim" chance for a coalition if Kouvelis agreed, "but his party is split right down the middle."The political deadlock has prompted warnings by European leaders that Greece could be thrown out of the euro if it does not stick to the spending cuts and economic reforms required by the bailout.German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said Europe and the IMF were still determined to help Greece, but the country could not be helped if it did not help itself.The EU and IMF say they will not give Greece any more money under the bailout until it has a government in place that renews its commitment to the terms agreed last year. Greece could run out of money as soon as the end of June if the loans stop."We do not have an infinite amount of time. Time is flying because there are financing needs, but the first steps have to be taken now from the Greek side," European Central Bank governing council member Ewald Nowotny said in Vienna.A senior SYRIZA party official said European leaders were bluffing by threatening to eject Greece from the euro to force it to stick to the bailout terms."Not only can't Greece be kicked out of the euro, they will be begging us to take the money," because if Greece were kicked out the crisis would spread to other European countries and the euro would collapse, said Dimitris Stratoulis.The prospect that Greece might declare bankruptcy and be pushed out of the euro caused panic across the single currency zone last year. But since then, European banks have written off the value of most of their Greek debt, which makes them less susceptible to shock if Greece should default.

Hollande worth $1.9 million

 

Francois Hollande, the Socialist 'Mr Normal' who will be sworn in as French president next week, says he is worth almost $1.9 million, considerably less than his predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy.Hollande, who campaigned on a promise to ditch the showbiz style that won Sarkozy the nickname of 'President Bling Bling', says in a declaration published on Friday that his principal asset is a house on France's southern Riviera coast.The declaration shows that Hollande, who rents his apartment in Paris but could now move into the presidential Elysee Palace, has declared assets of 1.17 million euros, primarily the house of 130 square metres in the chic Riviera village of Mougins.Other assets declared are bank accounts worth 8,200 euros, a life insurance contract worth 3,550 euros and 15,000 euros of furniture, said the declaration.The man who used to travel to work by scooter, and described himself as 'Mr Normal' during campaigning, does not own a car, the declaration says.Sarkozy, who hands the reins over to Hollande on May 15 and may go back to work as a lawyer, said in an official declaration in March he was worth about 2.7 million euros, up from 2.1 million when he took power in 2007.Most of that is in life insurance products but Sarkozy also declared a collection of autographs, watches and statuettes worth 100,000 euros, and a joint bank account of 57,000 euros he shares with his wife, the singer and former model Carla Bruni.Hollande's wealth falls just below the threshold that would make him liable to pay wealth tax in France.His French Riviera residence was bought in 1986 for just over half its current declared value and is the place where he spent summer breaks with former partner Segolene Royal, with whom he had four children in a quarter of a century together.He now lives with Valerie Trierweiler, a journalist who says she wants to remain working mother to pay the way for three sons she had before meeting Hollande.Hollande, whose doctor father Georges dabbled in property investment, said in his declaration he had part ownership of two apartments in Cannes that are worth 370,000 euros in all.Among the first measures he says he will implement after he takes over is a 30 percent cut in the presidential salary of more than 19,000 euros a month.