Hungary to decide on euro next week

The Hungarian government will next week announce the date when Hungary intends to adopt the euro, Finance Minister Tibor Draskovics said on Tuesday. "The government will announce next week, when it has to send a (euro) convergence report to Brussels, the date for the adoption of the euro," Draskovics told an economic conference in Budapest, quoted by MTI state-run news agency. Hungary, one of 10 mostly countries that joined the European Union on May 1, earlier said it would like to join the euro zone in 2008. But after a lacklustre economic year in 2003 that saw the public deficit swell to 5.8% of gross domestic product (GDP), the government appears set to push back the date. Last week Draskovics said on national television that he believed 2010 would the be ideal date to adopt the euro. To join the eurozone, a candidate country must limit its public deficit to 3.0% of GDP for at least two years under the ERM-II exchange rate mechanism before adopting the single currency.