Preview of the Greek general election Sunday 25th January 2015
Sunday is d-day for Greece, well possibly as they do like to drag an election out.
Here’s the brief on how it’s going to go down;
- 7am local time (5am GMT) the polls open and they close at 7pm local
- Exit polls will be published at the close with an initial result released around 9.30pm (7.30pm gmt)
- The vote count will be published here http://ekloges.ypes.gr/
- 22 parties are up for being elected and need 3% of the vote to win seats in the new parliament. Early indications are that 7 parties will pass
- The overall winner gets a 50 seat bonus
- The new PM will then have 15 days to win a confidence vote requiring 151 votes from the 300 seat parliament. It’s unlikely that any party will make that number
- If there is no absolute majority then the president gives the leading party 3 days to form a government, which is where negotiations come in with other parties
- Failure to form a government will see the president call leaders to form a unity government
- If that fails (like it did in 2012) Greece goes back to the polls
Samaras vs Tsipras Jan 25th. There can be only one! Or one made up of many. Or a mix of all of them. Or the same again in a month’s time. More chapters than Lord of The Rings this mob
What does it mean for the euro?
With Syriza leading the polls throughout, and Tsipras saying he doesn’t want to leave the eurozone, the market is probably expecting him to win. If the ND/Pasok coalition retain control that’s likely to give the euro a boost. The question will be how big that might be in the current bearish climate. I’m inclined to believe that any bounce will give sellers a sitting duck.
If Syriza win initially then that might just keep the pressure on the downside, but we’re likely to be going through several days of uncertainty while they try to form a majority government. On the election alone the market will tread water until a final outcome is clear. If it’s Syriza then the nerves might start to jangle as we try to guess how strong his expected renegotiation demands of the bailout agreement are. On balance the whole event slides in favour of a negative outcome for the euro.
Sunday opening could be interesting.
In 2012 there were some funky live graphics that plotted each seat as they were won so I’m trying to track down the best sources for live results and will add them to this post.