The global financial crisis has put the euro under stress. Interest-rate differentials across sovereign borrowers have risen to unprecendented levels and competitiveness is diverging across national economies, prompting speculation that countries might leave the euro or that highly indebted governments may be pushed into default. Speculation has added fuel to the fire, driving up interest-rate differentials by pulling money into safe bonds and away from those most at risk. But the euro is much better than any plausible alternative involving a return to national currencies. The European currency is not so much under stress as it is absorbing stress from its members. By looking at the experience of countries and their currencies outside the euro we get a better sense of what non-membership entails. Speculation that participants might leave the euro is hard to justify; rumours that countries outside the euro are now more eager to join are closer to the mark. The euro cannot solve the global financial crisis, but it is unlikely to be destroyed by it either; Europe's economic situation without the euro would not be better, but worse.