The joint action was based on the central banks' common understanding that, given the continued volatility in global financial markets, it was necessary to appropriately address elevated pressures in short-term funding markets and thereby facilitate the market adjustments in an orderly manner.
This is because the legacy of a financial crisis is a lot of debt. Working off that debt – in other words, deleveraging – drags down the economy. The recession following the recent global financial crisis has run true to form. In a world awash in debt, repairing the balance sheets of banks, households and governments can take years.