Belgium's government teetered on the edge of collapse Monday after Prime Minister Bart De Wever walked into the Royal Palace and handed King Philippe his cabinet's resignation, capping an all-night budget showdown that pushed Europe's debt-strained "Arizona" coalition to the brink.

De Wever spent roughly an hour and a half with the king after overnight talks among his core cabinet ministers failed to produce the deal he had demanded to keep the five-party coalition alive. He left the palace without speaking to reporters. The king's office said he "is taking his decision under consideration" and will spend Tuesday consulting the chairs of the coalition parties before meeting De Wever again on Friday, according to Euronews.

At stake is roughly 10 billion euros in savings the government needs to find to drag Belgium's finances back toward European Union deficit limits. Belgium ran a deficit equal to 5% of GDP last year, well above the EU's 3% ceiling, and its national debt has climbed past 735 billion euros — more than 110% of GDP, against a 60% limit. The impasse has already rattled bond markets, pushing up Belgium's borrowing costs.

'Too many sticking points'

The five-party coalition — De Wever's Flemish nationalist N-VA, the liberal MR, the centrist Les Engagés, the socialist Vooruit and the Christian democrat CD&V — has been split for weeks over how to close the gap. The centrist and socialist wings want to raise 1 to 1.5 billion euros by taxing higher incomes; the conservative wing, led by N-VA and the MR, is pushing for spending cuts instead.

Foreign Minister Maxime Prévot, whose Les Engagés party sits on the centrist side of that divide, told Belgian media there were simply too many unresolved disputes to list. Deputy Prime Minister David Clarinval, of the MR, instead pointed the finger at the socialists, saying Vooruit had insisted on higher taxes the rest of the coalition could not accept.

"If I were to list all the sticking points, it would take an eternity," Prévot said.

Opposition Green party lawmaker Matti Vandemaele was blunter, accusing De Wever of refusing to budge unless "everyone follows his N-VA programme." Critics have taken to calling him, less charitably, the "prime minister of standstill."

The king, in a short statement, said he regretted that no agreement had been reached and said Belgium "cannot afford a prolonged political crisis," urging all sides to put the national interest and compromise first.

It is not the first time De Wever has walked these palace steps. A year ago, almost to the day, he made the same trip after a similar budget deadlock — only for the palace to say resignation was never really on the table, and for De Wever to be handed 50 extra days to strike a deal, as Brussels Times reported at the time. This time, with the king openly weighing the request rather than brushing it aside, the stakes look higher: if Philippe accepts the resignation, Belgium would be forced into new elections just 21 months after the coalition was sworn in following 234 days of negotiations to form it in the first place.

For now, Belgium has a government in limbo, a budget nobody has signed off on, and a king taking the week to decide what happens next.