So far the rise in government security yields, banks’ fundraising problems, and the higher cost and reduced availability of credit to the economy have had a depressive effect on economic activity in Italy that is estimated at about one percentage point for 2012 as a whole. Without the Eurosystem’s interventions the effect would have been greater.
Italian banks’ assets pledged as collateral for Eurosystem refinancing have increased by about € billion, thanks to the possibility, introduced at EU level in December, of obtaining government guarantees for bank bonds. The collateral pool deposited with the Bank of Italy, net of haircuts, reached € billion, € billion of which was unencumbered and promptly usable.