Speculation about the impending collapse of the euro is enjoyable, if – for now – premature, but here’s an interesting poll from Le Monde showing that 61 percent of the French now regret abandoning the franc, including some 44 percent of those who had voted yes in the recent referendum on the EU’s draft ‘constitution’.

The article includes some other straws in the wind, none of which bode particularly well for the EU’s single currency, including comments from the German economy minister on the considerable price that Germany has paid for adopting Brussels’ funny money and the (somewhat bizarre) suggestion by an Italian minister that the lira should be re-launched alongside the euro.

We’ll see what happens next, but it needs to be said again that these problems are the direct result of allowing political rather than economic factors to determine whether the euro should or should not have been launched.

Brussels, determined to pursue ‘the project’ went for the politics – and an entire continent is now paying the price.

Reliably gloomy they may be, but the Swedes must be laughing today.