VOA标准英语2012--World's Economy Still Focused on Europe

（单词翻译）

World's Economy Still Focused on Europe

New reports out Friday show German business confidence declined in June.

Chinese manufacturing continues to shrink.

And the number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits hit a nine-month high.

Expectations were naturally high on Friday as leaders of France, Germany, Italy and Spain met in Rome. Despite announcing general agreement on a $160 billion plan to revive economic growth, analysts¹ say fixing what ails² Europe will require more than money.

Thanos Veremis is a Greek political historian:

"If you want to save the euro, you have to do much more than just hand out money around, you need to create a ministry³ of the exchequer⁴ - or whatever you call it in England - or a minister of finance or a common fiscal⁵ policy, which we don't have in Europe," said Veremis.

Structural⁶ reforms from a European banking⁷ consortium to jointly⁸ issued euro-bonds are just a few of the ideas gaining momentum⁹ - especially after formation of a new coalition¹⁰ government in Greece failed to ease concerns about the deepening fiscal crisis.

With the world's major economies slowing down, some investors¹¹ were eager to see stimulative¹² action from the U.S.

But financial markets were ultimately disappointed Wednesday after U.S. central bank chairman Ben Bernanke announced only the extension of an earlier program to maintain interest rates at record lows.

Experts say the Fed still has a few options, including expanding its balance sheet to make more U.S. dollars available, but market strategist Stephen Wood says the Federal Reserve may be conserving¹³ its fire power.

"I think in some ways the Federal Reserve, like the European Central Bank - they want to keep a little bit of their powder dry just in case the financial situation in Europe gets out of control."

Despite agreement on the need to bolster¹⁴ economic growth, European leaders remain at odds¹⁵ over how to do it.

Among the thorny¹⁶ issues likely to come up at the European Summit in Brussels on Thursday, June 28 is a proposal to use Europe's existing bailout funds to buy debt from ailing¹⁷ economies in Spain, Italy and Greece.