EZ Banking Sector As a Percentage of GDP (2000-2013)

This great chart by Thomson Reuters shows the Euro Zone bankings sectors of their respective countries GDP. With Luxembourg leading with a big gap, Ireland and Cyprus follow. Slovenia and Greece have notably small banking sectors.


Click on the picture for a bigger version.

Credit Ratings, U.S., Japan and Euro Zone (Oct 2012)

Thompson Reuters created this graph with the long term sovereign debt ratings for the Western countries. For the three major credit rating institutions the ratings are listed.

Thompson Reuters

Government Debt in the EU Countries (second quarter 2012)

This great graph from Reuters shows per EU country the government debt it had at the end of the second quarter, as a percentage of GDP.

Since the crisis Portugal, Ireland have been accumulating debt at a high rate, while seeing their economy shrink significantly. This is shows in the government-debt-to-GDP measure, for which they are in respectively  the third and the fourth place in having the highest government debt in the EU.

Estonia and Bulgaria have the lowest government debt in the EU.

Credit Ratings Of European Countries: Another Update

Since Italy has been downgraded by Standard & Poors Reuters released a new graph of the current Euro Zone sovereign debt ratings. Austria, Finland, France, Germany, Netherlands and Austria still have AAA-ratings. Greece has the lowest rating C.

EU Bailout Fund (EFSF) Guarantees Per Country

The EU Bailout Fund for countries in financial problems called the European Financial Stability Facility has been created in may 2010. The EFSF lends on the financial markets by issuing bonds. These bonds are of the highest quality because the money is guaranteed by AAA-countries (with the highest credit ratings in the world). These countries are: Germany, France, Netherlands, Finland, Austria and Luxembourg.

The Wall Street Journal explains the difference between the current form of the EFSF and how it will change this fall:

''EFSF 1.0 (which is the current version) uses an absurdly complicated combination of prepaid interest, cash buffers, overguarantees and the like to ensure that all its debt issues are backed by triple-A guarantees or cash. EFSF 2.0, expected to be ratified this fall, makes things (relatively) simpler.

In EFSF 2.0, all the 17 countries pledge guarantees totaling €779.8 billion. Subtracting the guarantees of bailed-out Greece, Ireland and Portugal brings the total down to €726 billion. The countries agree that every EFSF bond will be backed by up to 165% of its size in guarantees, so the EFSF can borrow a maximum of €440 billion (since €440 billion x 1.65 = €726 billion).''

In total the EFSF 2,0 requires 450 billion euro's of guarantees by AAA-Countries. If France loses it's AAA-rating the other countries see their guarantees raise by 54%.

Debt Ceiling: The United States Bonds Are 59% of Total AAA Government-Issued Debt

This picture shows that the United States government bonds are very important in the total AAA-rated government bond market.

Think Progress

Credit Ratings Of European Countries: Update

Since the last graph on the Euro Zone Credit Ratings Portugal and Ireland have been downgraded by Moody's. This graph from Reuters gives a great overview of the ratings of Euro Zone countries by the three rating agencies.

Reuters

Leverage Ratio's Around The World

The IMF composed this chart with leverage ratios of banks around the world.

Ritholtz

Change in Industrial Production in the Eurozone 2005-2010

Der Spiegel made a great graph with the percentage change in the Industrial Production for the Eurozone countries between 2005 and 2010. Check Belgium and Luxembourg. Click on the image for a bigger version.