An objective assessment of the growing risk of sovereign debt defaultand its massive implications for the global economy. Investors now fear certain nations will be unable to pay their debts. These are not idle or academic concerns. Rising mortgage defaults and credit card delinquencies put many banks on the brink of bankruptcy in 2008, sending the global economy into a tailspin. Sovereign debt defaults could have even greater ramifications, endangering global recovery and causing geopolitical instability and social unrest.