Brussels, 25/02/2013 (Agence Europe) - Last week, the European Central Bank published the first details (just ahead of the Italian general elections) of the country-by-country breakdown of its eurozone bond buy-up programme, SMP.
Of the total of €208.7 billion of bonds bought by the bank, the breakdown by country is as follows: - Italy: €99 billion; - Spain: €43.7 billion; - Greece: €30.8 billion; - Portugal: €21.6 billion; - Ireland: €13.6 billion.
SMP started in May 2010 to put a stop to the spiralling Greek lending rates, and was reactivated in August 2011 to help Spain and Italy. It was suspended in March 2012 and then replaced by the OMT programme in the face of opposition from Germany's Bundesbank. There is no upper limit on the second programme, which has not yet been activated. In order to be eligible for OMT, eurozone countries are first required to have made an official request for aid from the European Stability Mechanism. (MB/transl.fl)