Following the lead of many other countries around the world, Denmark’s government has agreed to extend a 100 billion kroner (USD 17.8 billion) credit line to the nation’s banks. The new bill will be presented to parliament this week, where it is expected to speedily pass and come into effect in February. Read the full story

The significant protests that began at lunchtime yesterday are still going on outside the Althingi parliament in Reykjavik, despite it now being past midnight. Read the full story

Sweden’s government has released data showing the nation’s economic growth has slowed to its weakest levels in more than 30 years. Anders Borg, Sweden’s Finance Minister, announced the bad news along with a forecast that the Swedish economy will shrink by 0.8 percent in 2009. Read the full story

Registered unemployed figures in Iceland in December 2008 were 4.8 percent, or around 7,902 people – an increase of some 45 percent on November, according to new figured from the Directorate of Labour. Icelandic unemployment has not been higher since January 1997. Read the full story

The London School of Economics professor and Iceland expert, Robert Wade appeared on Iceland’s most popular political magazine programme Kastljos this week.

In the nearly 13 minute-long interview, Wade expressed his frustration that his (and others’) dire warnings on the Icelandic economy were not listened to over recent years. Read the full story

An article written by Georg Brynjarsson, sourced from his University of California research paper in business:

After 5 years of the highest growth in the OECD area Iceland is facing the consequences of trying to build an international banking empire on the back of an economy of roughly 300.000 people with the smallest free floating currency in the world and an industry based primarily on fishing and aluminium smelting. Read the full story

Readers of the website of the Danish national broadcaster dr.dk chose the New Year’s message from Fridrik Weisshappel the best of the 24 which were posted before Christmas. Weisshappel is an Icelandic entrepreneur in Denmark. Read the full story

A statement of intent was signed yesterday evening on the purchase of Ferdaskrifstofa Islands (The Icelandic Travel Office) by Iceland Express, the country’s budget airline.

Ferdaskrifstofa Islands is the mother company of three of Iceland’s biggest travel agents: Plus Ferdir, Urval Utsyn and Sumar Ferdir. An aeroplane was stranded in Tenerife yesterday Read the full story

In a gesture of help to struggling Latvia, the central banks of Denmark and Sweden have offered the small Baltic nation a credit line worth EUR 500 million. The agreements in place will allow Latvia to borrow EUR 125 million from Denmark’s Nationalbank, and EUR 375 million from Sweden’s Riksbank. Both of the loans will be given against Latvia’s own currency, the lat. Read the full story

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is happy with Iceland’s progress in stabilising its economy, Poul Thomsen said in a press conference yesterday at the end of his team’s first inspection visit to the country. Read the full story