The acute phase of the crisis is clearly over – for now. There are some signs of a normalisation in the inter-banking market. Sovereign spreads have come down. Italy and Spain will both manage to fund their fiscal deficits until next year. The European Central Bank’s longer-term refinancing operations have propped up the banks. The new Outright Monetary Transactions programme, if it is ever activated, will prop up the sovereigns. If you thought of the lethal interaction between banks and sovereign as two drunks in a pub propping each other up, the ECB has given them separate crutches. They can walk. Does this mean that the crisis is over?
此次危機的急性發作階段顯然已經過去——就目前而言是如此。一些跡象表明，銀行間市場已趨于正常。主權債務息差已縮窄。從現在到明年，意大利和西班牙都會成功為財政赤字融資。歐洲央行(ECB)的較長期再融資操作已經起到扶持銀行的作用。新的直接貨幣交易(Outright Monetary Transactions, OMT)計劃若得到啟用，將扶持相關主權國家政府。如果你把銀行與主權國家之間的致命聯系想成兩個在酒吧里相互攙扶的醉漢，那么現在歐洲央行給了他們一人一根拐杖。他們能走了。但這是否意味著這場危機已結束？