Wausau, WI 9/14/2011 (PennyPayDay) – The euro was stable Wednesday morning in New York, supported by tentative hopes that Europe will act decisively to manage their sovereign debt crisis.European leaders are scrambling to avoid the contagion that may be brought on by a Greek default that appears more inevitable with every passing day. Greece's Prime Minister will hold a conference call with his counterparts from Germany and France this afternoon.
Europe has the capacity to confront its sovereign debt crisis and will not allow its largest to fail, U.S Treasury secretary Timothy Geithner said Wednesday.
Europe won't allow a Lehman Brothers event to happen, Geithner told CNBC's Jim Cramer ahead of his meeting with European Union finance ministers in Poland.
With China reportedly in talks to backstop Italian debt, markets are expressing very cautious optimism that a wider crisis can be averted.
The European Commission will soon present options for the introduction of Eurobonds, Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said Wednesday.
However, he cautioned that this will not bring an immediate solution for all the problems faced by the region. Moody's Investors Service Inc. Wednesday announced a one-notch downgrade of the long-term ratings of French banking giants Credit Agricole SA and Société Générale SA.
Still, the euro was steady near $1.37 versus the dollar, more than 2 cents from a 7-month low of $1.3493 set earlier this week.
There was little movement versus the yen near Y105, although the Japanese currency edged toward its record highs versus the dollar.
U.S. retail sales were unchanged in August, according to government figures released Wednesday, disappointing economists, who had generally expected a slight advance.
In addition, July's growth, which had represented the strongest performance since March, was revised lower. The U.S. Commerce Department revealed that August sales figures came in at $389.5 billion, virtually unchanged from the June figure.
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