* * * Madam Chair, Honourable members of the Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee, Ladies and gentlemen, I very much appreciate the opportunity to speak to you today at my quarterly hearing before this Committee as ECB President. These regular exchanges are important at the best of times, and even more so when times are difficult.
Survey measures of business confidence have lifted from the very low levels seen at the beginning of the year to be close to their long run average. Capacity utilisation has stopped its sharp decline. Business credit has been falling, but this has been more than offset by increases in non intermediated sources of funding, such as equity raisings and corporate bond issuance.