At the European level, we recently observed an increase in recourse to the Eurosystem’s deposit facility, an alarming indication for mounting distrust among commercial banks.   This re-emergence of financial market tensions led to swift monetary policy action worldwide.
Central banks, which had already started to phase out some of their exceptional policy measures implemented during the crisis and had begun the monetary tightening cycle, envisaged the re-introduction of some of their expansionary policy measures. The Federal Reserve announced its commitment to keep key interest rates at the current low level at least until 2013.