Bad news for Greece. Yesterday's 2-year government bond yields jumped 2.55 percentage points to a record high 11 percent, forcing the country to look to the E.U. for credit.

Greece today tested the mettle of the European Union by asking it and the International Monetary Fund for a $60 billion loan.

If Greece is turned down, it’s likely to default on its 300-billion-euro debt—potentially imperiling large swaths of the European economy, international ties across the continent, and the future of the 11-year-old euro currency.

How likely it is that that will happen depends on whom you ask.

Politicians across Europe will are saying they’re ready to come to Greece’s aid. The bond market, conversely, says default may be impending. The cost of Greek debt today remained high, and the Financial Times reports that no one’s selling insurance on the bonds.

Greece’s plea to the E.U. today came on the heels of a massive spike in Greece’s 2-year government bond yields, or the interest it would have to pay on a 2-year loan. After information emerged on Greece’s large debt, yields broke records yesterday by rising to more than 11 percent (see chart). This makes it extremely difficult for Greece to borrow unless it gets money from alternate sources. After a statement today from the Greek president, those yields fell, but only to 9.41 percent.

How did Greece get here? Some economists point to the euro itself as a likely culprit.  Greece went overboard with the cheap loans it got as a E.U. member, according to Paul Krugman (His full column is here.), so much so that when they stopped coming it found itself addicted to weaning sources of credit and with its prices vastly inflated.

Potential solutions, Krugman writes, include tax hikes and “savage spending cuts” (Greece has already implemented severe austerity measures), pulling out of the euro and devaluing its currency (which would trigger “massive runs on the banking system”), or getting cash to stabilize the system from somewhere besides the market itself. Germany is a likely source, but the country faces vast political obstacles in guaranteeing Greece’s loans. So now Greece finds itself turning to the E.U. and the IMF, relying on the bonds of the E.U. and its commitment to ensuring the strength of its currency.

According to Bloomberg News, the euro traded at a one-year low yesterday, after slipping 7 percent this year as Greece dragged down investor confidence. It looked up, though, after Greece’s public plea today, rising to $1,3311 today from yesterday’s $1.3261.