I therefore think it is all the more important to stress that the ECB’s recent decisions, in the face of the crisis, have aimed to preserve the effective transmission of monetary policy via the bank channel: the conditions for TLTRO-IIIs, these targeted longer-term refinancing operations, have been significantly eased (up to 50 percentage points lower than the deposit facility rate if the target for lending during the “Covid period” is reached, or currently –1%). This radical innovation represents a reduction of several billion euros in annual costs for the European banking system. New operations have also been announced (bridge LTROs, PELTROs or Pandemic Emergency Longer-Term Refinancing Operations). Since the implementation of these measures, the outstanding amount of refinancing provided by the Eurosystem to euro area banks has increased sharply, to more than EUR 1,000 billion, even before the June TLTRO. The easing of the collateral framework, for its part, has significantly increased the amount of assets eligible for operations, and supported the supply of credit to the private sector. First, by expanding the use of credit claims (bank loans) as collateral. But also by temporarily lowering the haircut applied to collateral by 20 percentage points for all assets (and by an additional 20 percentage points for credit claims), or by increasing from 2.5% to 10% the maximum share of unsecured bank debt securities in a credit institution’s 2/3  BIS central bankers' speeches  collateral pool.
Ask not what the economy can do for insurers – ask what insurers can do for the economy Speech given by Anna Sweeney, Executive Director, Insurance Supervision Division Delivered at the Bank of America 25th European Financials CEO Conference 22 September 2020  I am grateful to Alan Sheppard, Megan Bell and Zachary Morris-Dyer for their assistance preparing this speech. 1  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/speeches and @BoE_PressOffice  Good morning and thank you to Bank of America for inviting me to speak here today. In a normal year, I would use these remarks to run through our regulatory agenda. But this year it is inevitable that my remarks will focus on the effects of Covid-19: a human tragedy for millions, the worst economic crisis in the UK for several centuries and an unparalleled global challenge. Our economy and the actors within it are continuing to face numerous challenges and a great deal of uncertainty. The aim of the Bank of England – along with colleagues from other public sector institutions – has been to build a bridge across the economic disruption caused by the pandemic. And insurers – as providers of protection, as guarantors of retirement income and as institutional investors - have an important role to play in the recovery from that crisis.