Portugal Makes Its Triumphant Return

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Slowly but surely, former problem countries in Europe are returning to normalcy.

The latest is Portugal, which just sold 750 million euros in 10-year bonds at a yield of 3.5752%, according to CNBC.

Just recently, Greece returned to the bond market with a sale of short-term debt.

Not only has Portugal successfully floated this debt, its borrowing costs are at an 8-year low, an astounding fact for a country that was once thought to be a default candidate.

The story is the same as the rest of Europe: The market believes that governments have an implied backstop from the ECB, preventing default. And with the Eurozone facing possible deflation and more QE, everyone's hungry to snap up all this (relatively) high-yielding peripheral debt.