Passage 2
Building of Europe's Financial Firewall
Paris wanted a strong signal sent to the markets, a financial firewall of one trillion euros available to help struggling euro zone menbers. That was a little too rich for Berlin' s taste, however and the monetary bloc's' finance ministers fnally settled on total of 800 billion.
"This amount is very important because when the Intemnational Monetary Fund and G20 liscussed, their participation depended on what Europe would do. Europe has now clearly fixed this amount.
Out of that total, 300 billion had already been pledged to Greece, Portugal. and Ireland by combining both Europe's temporary rescue fund the EFSF and the new ESM, the European Stability Mechanism. The continent's' new bailout(紧急救助) capacity now stands at 500 billion euros.
"Financial markets want to know if Europe is able to undertake structural reforms that could permanently ensure the stability of the currency and the investments. Here we are making great progress in the member states and the structure of the European currency. That's crucial.
The esm will come online from the first of July and will work in tandem with (和...联合) the existing EFSF for one year.
The first 300 billion euro loans had already been pledged to Greece, Portugal, and Ireland.
A、正确
B、错误
【正确答案】：A
【名师解析】:根据提供的题目内容和答案选项，题目要求判断文章中关于欧洲金融防火墙的描述是否正确。文章提到巴黎希望建立一个价值一万亿欧元的金融防火墙来帮助困难的欧元区成员国，但柏林觉得这个数额过高，最终欧元区的财政部长们达成了8000亿欧元的共识。国际货币基金组织和G20的参与取决于欧洲的行动，欧洲现在已经明确了这个数额。其中3000亿欧元已经承诺给希腊、葡萄牙和爱尔兰，通过结合欧洲的临时救助基金EFSF和新的ESM，欧洲稳定机制，欧洲大陆的新救助能力现在是5000亿欧元。文章还提到，金融市场希望了解欧洲是否能够进行结构性改革，以确保货币和投资的长期稳定，欧洲在这方面取得了重大进展。ESM将从7月1日开始运作，并与现有的EFSF联合运作一年。
题目答案为A，即正确。根据文章内容，这个判断是准确的，因为文章中所描述的金融防火墙的数额、已经承诺的贷款数额、以及ESM和EFSF的联合运作情况都与题目中的描述相符。
