Short-term response to stabilise markets  When financial and credit market turmoil produces systemic tensions in money markets, distinguishing between the aims of liquidity provision and the reasons that stand behind the setting of policy interest rates – easy under normal circumstances – becomes more difficult.
The aim is to ensure that these banks’ finances are sound before the SSM is launched so that they are not found to have major write-down needs just after the SSM has started its work. That would be a heavy political burden for the SSM to bear – especially if banks then had to be recapitalised or restructured following such write-downs.