WASHINGTON — The head of the International Monetary Fund said Thursday that the debt crisis in Greece is serious and there would be no “silver bullet” to resolve the issue in an easy manner.
IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn said negotiations with the IMF over conditions for a support package were just beginning and would take some time to be resolved.
But Strauss-Kahn told reporters that the IMF was not considering some type of restructuring of Greek debt that would make holders of the debt accept something less than full value for their loans.
That worry has roiled markets in recent days.
“It is clear that the Greek situation is a very serious one,” Strauss-Kahn said. “There is no single way, no silver bullet to solve it in an easy manner.”
Strauss-Kahn spoke before talks over the next three days among global finance officials including finance ministers and central-bank governors of the Group of 20 nations.
Also Thursday, Moody’s Investor Services downgraded its rating on Greece’s debt by one notch to A3 from A2 and warned that further downgrades were a possibility.
