Receiving Wide Coverage ...
Greece Folds: Greece has struck a deal with European leaders that would allow it to stay in the eurozone but at a heavy cost. Under the terms of the deal, the country would receive a bailout package of up to 86 billion ($96 billion) in exchange for "punishing" austerity measures and what the Financial Times deems "the most intrusive economic supervision program ever mounted in the EU." Among the most controversial measures is a requirement that Greece put $50 billion of state-owned assets into a fund that would be supervised by Europeans and designated to be used for bank recapitalization, loan repayments and privatization. Greece would also put its economic reforms under the supervision of the International Monetary Fund and concede to a "public administration overhaul overseen by the European Commission," according to the FT. However, it's unclear if Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras will be able to get the country's parliament to approve the pledges by Wednesday, which means the deal could still fall through. The FT's Martin Sandbu suggests that bailout negotiations only got so dire because of European creditors' unnecessarily harsh initial demands and adds that the crisis has proved that the European Central Bank is a political rather than independent entity. Speaking of the ECB, the Times says Greek banks will likely stay closed this week because the central bank is unlikely to issue more emergency loans until the bailout agreement is sealed. As word of creditors' aggressive demands spread, the hashtag #ThisIsACoup was trending on Twitter, a sentiment New York Times columnist Paul Krugman deems "exactly right. The Wall Street Journal says that eurozone finance ministers' statement on Greece "will go down as one of the most brutal diplomatic démarches in the history of the European Union, a bloc built to foster peace and harmony that is now publicly threatening one of its own with ruination unless it surrenders." The paper also culls reactions to the deal from investors, strategists and analysts, most of whom seem to think a Greece exit from the euro is unlikely but still possible. A separate column suggests that Bitcoin and/or bitcoin technology could be used to help countries like Greece handle future crises.
Pao Leaves Reddit: Since the dearth of women CEOs is a frequent topic among American Banker's Most Powerful Women in Banking participants, it's worth noting that their numbers have dwindled even further with the resignation of Reddit interim chief Ellen Pao. Pao stepped down Friday in the wake of turmoil over the company's dismissal of an employee liaison beloved by the website's notoriously tough-to-corral moderators. (While Reddit users blamed Pao for the firing, company co-founder Alexis Ohanian has said that it was actually his decision.) However, Pao says her exit was not prompted by Reddit users' backlash: instead she says it was the result of a disagreement with the company's top brass over what constitutes a realistic growth goal, according to the Journal. Pao's tenure at Reddit was short (eight months) but widely publicized, particularly because of her efforts to crack down on the website's trolls and her workplace-discrimination lawsuit against former employers Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. The Guardian's Beth Winegarner says that her exit "has also left an industry reckoning with the all-too-familiar reality of gender and racial bias." The Washington Post observes that Pao's attempts to combat harassment on Reddit ultimately made her a target of it.
Wall Street Journal
Banks and their investors are in a state of limbo as they watch the Federal Reserve for signs about when it will raise interest rates. The markets seem to think a December hike is more likely than a September one in the wake of tumult in Greece and China, according to "Heard on the Street."
An op-ed by U.S. Treasury official Antonio Weiss takes on industry players who have been calling for regulatory rollbacks as a solution to market illiquidity. Weiss argues that some parts of the markets are performing just fine, thank you very much, and what issues do exist are more the result of technological changes in market structure than over-regulation. "Our focus, in both the private and public sectors, should be on adapting to the dynamics of the new marketplace, not on returning to a past whose rules can't reasonably apply to us now," he writes. One commenter recommended a more cut-and-dry path to market stability: "What should happen is those that leverage too much, or too riskily, need to exit stage left."
Financial Times
Is the Bloomberg terminal worth its $24,000 annual price tag? The paper's readers are split on the question. Some call it a glorified chat service, while others see the value in its streamlined approach to data gathering.
The London Whale swims free, and the paper wonders why. The UK Financial Conduct Authority tried to take aim at former JPMorgan Chase trader Bruno Iksil, who was at the center of the $6 billion scandal. But the legal committee that vets the FCA's cases blocked the action from going forward. While the committee's reasoning is unknown, one anonymouse suggests that Iksil may have gotten off the hook because his losses were the result of incompetence rather than regulatory violations.
New York Times
Teenagers who take summer jobs as bank tellers gain a lot of insight into the inner workings Americans' financial lives, according to a "Your Money" column. One important lesson: never judge customers' net worth by their appearance. A credit union worker says she always tells young employees about "a guy dressed like 'Farmer Joe' with a stalk of wheat he was chewing on and a bushy beard and dirty fingernails. He had millions."
Elsewhere ...
Time: The gaps in financial services identified by fintech companies like Lending Club and Betterment can help legislators better develop future policies aimed at helping low- and middle-income Americans, Patricia Hart of New America writes in Time. Those policies could include "more community credit unions, subsidies and tax credits for financial services, or a government-run option like postal banking."
