These measures include allowing banks to borrow as much liquidity from the ECB as they need; expanding the range of collateral they can use to access that liquidity; intervening in bond markets that were malfunctioning, like the sovereign bond market or the covered bond market; and launching two three-year Long-Term Refinancing Operations (LTROs), which injected more than 1 trillion euro into the euro area banking system.
Overall, our balance sheet increased from just below 1.5 trillion euro before the crisis to more than 3 trillion euro at its peak. BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  Our measures are primarily focused on banks because, in the euro area, bank lending is the main channel through which firms and households get access to finance.