Cyprus in Crisis: Troika Likely to Ignore Nicos Anastasiades' Angry Bailout Terms Letter

Cyprus looks unlikely to get any change to its €10bn bailout terms, as senior eurozone officials reportedly poured cold water on an angry letter from Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades complaining about the conditions.

Two anonymous senior eurozone figures, cited by Reuters, said there would be no revision to the Cyprus bailout conditions set by the troika making the loan - the International Monetary Fund (IMF), European Union (EU), and European Central Bank (ECB).

They added that Anastasiades knows this, but is merely playing politics to try and impress the Cypriot electorate.

Under the bailout deal, approved after days of political wrangling in the Cypriot parliament which nearly resulted in the state's exit from the eurozone, Cyprus had to quickly raise €5.8bn (£5bn, $7.8bn). It had originally planned to do this by haircutting all bank deposits in the country.

Public outcry at the potential loss to ordinary people's deposits caused lawmakers to instead find the cash by shutting down Popular Bank - commonly known as Laiki and the country's second largest financial institution - and handing over some of its assets to Bank of Cyprus, as well as its emergency liquidity assistance (ELA) liability.

They then converted portions of the largest Bank of Cyprus deposits into equity to recapitalise it in a "bail-in".

In his letter to the Troika - the IMF, EU and European Central Bank - which issued the €10bn bailout, Anastasiades said that the Bank of Cyprus bail-in was "implemented without careful preparation". The president said it had left many of the countries firms without working capital.

Anastasiades wants more loans from the eurozone to roll back the Laiki-Bank of Cyprus deal that saw the two banks effectively merged.

He also attacked the Troika for not giving Cyprus enough slack given its part in keeping Greece afloat.

"The heavy burden placed on Cyprus by the restructuring of Greek debt was not taken into consideration when it was Cyprus's turn to seek help," said Anastasiades in the letter, which was published by the Financial Times.