Danish Government In Trouble Over Deal With Goldman Sachs
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Denmark's government is in turmoil after a socialist party quit the ruling coalition over a deal with Goldman Sachs, Richard Milne of The Financial Times reports.
The deal involves Goldman purchasing a 19% stake in state-owned utility Dong Energy for $1.5 billion. Denmark's shareholding would fall to about 60%.
Denmark's Socialist People's Party withdrew its six ministers from the 23-member Cabinet. Party leader Annette Vilhelmsen noted that she would continue to support the ruling coalition while and some center-left politicians accusing the government of betrayal.
Milne notes that the minority government of Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt has been fragile since it was formed in 2011, but the Goldman row is by far the most serious threat to its survival.
"The Dong share sale is putting more nails in the government's coffin," said Christoffer Green-Pedersen, a political science professor at the University of Aarhus, told Bloomberg.
Bloomberg reports that 68% of Danes are against Goldman holding the stake and thousands of protesters gathered outside the parliament last night to voice their anger over the deal. An online petition gathered more than 185,000 signatures against the deal. The Danish parliament's finance committee is due to vote today on the bid by the fifth-largest U.S. bank. "The votes are there," a spokesman for Thorning-Schmidt's ruling party told Bloomberg.Here's a shot of the protests from Twitter user @sorenwillumsen: