17:27

PS: Greece’s government spokesman (a reader of this blog, it seems) has got in touch to repudiate any suggestion that Greek savers could face a levy, as part of a new aid deal for Greece.

From Athens, Helena Smith reports

I just took a call from Gavriel Sakellarides hotly denying any notion that a bail-in is being considered.

“We exclude any such scenario,” Sakellarides told me adding that he only mentioned the subject at today’s daily briefing because a journalist brought it up.

“I was asked about it and wholeheartedly ruled it out. The stability of the financial sector and banking system is very important to us. Categorically there will be no bail in.”

Government sources are now saying that while they expect progress to be made by technical teams this week, a breakthrough is unlikely to happen by the time the EU summit begins on Thursday.

One insider said:

“The Riga summit will see progress on a technical level and perhaps meetings on the sidelines (between Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras and his counterparts) but we don’t expect a deal to be agreed there. That will likely require an emergency eurogroup meeting before the end of May.”

It was vital, the source acknowledged, that an agreement was reached by the end of May “but that is also up to the other side too. We have already made lots of concessions. Labour market reform and pensions are the two things we are not going to go back on.”