Greece has secured an overwhelming acceptance of a bond swap offer to private creditors and beat its own most optimistic forecasts, according to a senior official.
The deadline expired tonight on a deal needed to avoid a chaotic debt default.
The government official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said take-up on the offer was around 95% an hour before the offer closed at 8pm GMT with responses still coming in.
The biggest sovereign debt restructuring in history will see bond holders accept losses of some 74% on the value of their investments in a deal that will cut more than €100bn from Greece's crippling public debt.
Preliminary results from the offer are expected to be announced officially at 6am GMT tomorrow and Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos will hold a news conference before a call with eurozone finance ministers in the afternoon.
Eurozone ministers are to decide whether to clear the package.
Earlier today, European Union Economic and Monetary Affairs Commissioner Olli Rehn had urged private holders of Greek bonds to sign up to a vital debt swap deal.
He said there would be no better offer and the deal was vital for eurozone financial stability.
Athens, totally reliant on international support to stave off a default that could set off a severe banking crisis across the eurozone, has asked its private sector creditors to accept steep losses on their Greek bond holdings.
Investors are being asked to give up almost three quarters of the value of their holdings in return for new Greek bonds in a bid to cut a public debt burden that amounts to around 160% of Greece's GDP.
Provided it reaches a two thirds threshold of those who respond to the offer, Athens has said it will impose collective action clauses that would allow it to impose the deal on all its bondholders.
It has warned that it will pay nothing to investors who refuse to sign up
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