Europe needs a plan for any future financial shocks… and it’s struggling to reach a concrete deal

Yuriko Nakao | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Wopke Hoekstra, Dutch finance minister.

Ricardo Garcia, chief euro zone economist at UBS, also played down the prospect of any big achievements this week. “Expectations are low, the Eurogroup last week lacked a breakthrough, so there won’t be any tangible decisions beyond declarations of intent or agreements in principle,” he told CNBC via email.

The June 29 summit had until now been mentioned as a milestone for euro zone reform. And in the last few weeks, France and Germany had come together to present a common plan.

However, there are still other countries that need to be convinced, in particular the Netherlands. A letter was co-signed last week by 11 countries, including the Dutch, that opposed the Franco-German idea of a common euro zone budget.

“The bigger issue in our view is to convince other core countries outside of France and Germany, rather than Italy, to buy into ideas like a euro zone budget,” Garcia said. “France and Germany have spearheaded the initiative, now it’s about getting other strong countries on board. That will take time, at least until year end.”