The euro just celebrated its 10th birthday.
But that birthday celebration came with little fanfare as the currency bloc continues to struggle to work out its debt debacle.
The Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR), a leading think tank, thinks there's a 99% chance the euro will be no more with 10 years, reports The Telegraph's Rachel Cooper.
"It now looks as though 2012 will be the year when the euro starts to break up," the CEBR said.
The think tank added that Britain could well be in recession already, with growth likely to contract in the final quarter of 2011 and the first quarter of 2012.
The CEBR believes both Greece and Italy will the euro. However, this could be a relatively slow, drawn out process. They only see a a 60% chance that a country leaves the euro by the end of the year.
"It's become clearer in the last year of the virtual political impossibility of doing the deal that would be necessary to make the euro survive," said [Douglas McWilliams, the CEBR's CEO].
"To make the euro survive in the longer term, it needs countries to be sufficiently competitive to have some economic growth to be able to pay off their debts".
But, the CEBR has little faith that will happen.
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See Also:
- The Eurozone Crisis For Dummies
- EURO-MESS: Your Complete Guide To All Of Those Euro Crisis Acronyms And Abbreviations
- EL-ERIAN TO IMF: Stop Kowtowing To Europe