30 March 2020 | 13:15
The EU is taking swift action to make available money to help tackle the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Council today adopted two legislative acts to quickly release funding from the EU budget for tackling the COVID-19 crisis. One of the acts amends the rules of the structural and investment funds, while the other extends the scope of the EU Solidarity Fund.
The Coronavirus Response Investment Initiative will give member states access to €37 billion of cohesion money to strengthen healthcare systems, as well as support small and medium-sized enterprises, short-term working schemes, and community-based services.
Of the total, about €8 billion will come from unspent pre-financing in 2019 under the structural funds. The new measure allows member states to spend unused money to mitigate the impact of the pandemic instead of returning it to the EU budget. Another €29 billion will be disbursed early from allocations which would have been due later this year.
Expenditure will be made available as of 1 February 2020 to cover costs already incurred in efforts to save lives and protect citizens.
Member states will also have greater flexibility to make transfers between cohesion policy programmes in order to redirect resources to where they are most needed.
The Council also amended the scope of the EU Solidarity Fund to include public health emergencies in addition to natural disasters. This will help member states and accession countries meet people’s immediate needs during the coronavirus pandemic.
Next steps
Given the urgency of the situation, both legislative acts will be published in the Official Journal of the European Union on 31 March and will enter into force on 1 April 2020.
Regulation concerning the Coronavirus Response Investment Initiative
Regulation extending the scope of the EU Solidarity Fund
Compliments of the European Council.

March 25, 2020
Yesterday, the Commission adopted decisions on harmonised standards which will allow manufacturers to place on the market high performing devices to protect patients, health care professionals and citizens in general. The standards will facilitate a faster and less expensive conformity assessment procedure. The revised harmonised standards play a pivotal role in the current coronavirus pandemic because they relate to critical devices* such as:
medical face masks
surgical drapes, gowns and suits
washer-disinfectors
sterilisation
Stella Kyriakides, Commissioner for Health said: “We must not waste a second in our fight against the coronavirus. With the measures we adopt today, we speed up the entry of safe, essential medical equipment and devices such as masks, gowns and suits in the EU market. This equipment is fundamental for our health professionals – the brave and resilient women and men at the front line – to keep saving lives”.
Once implemented, the use of these standards will allow manufacturers of medical devices and other concerned economic operators, to comply with the health and safety requirements of the EU legislation, taking into account the most updated technical solutions. These standards, once referenced in the Official Journal of the European Union, grant conformity of devices with the requirements of the three Directives on medical devices.
The decision to adopt these harmonised standards for medical devices represents an additional measure taken by the Commission to respond to the coronavirus outbreak. Also upon the urgent request of the Commission, the European Committee for Standardization (CEN) and the European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization (CENELEC), in cooperation with their members made available a number of European standards for certain medical devices and personal protective equipment.
Background
European standards are an essential pillar of a fully functioning internal market. They reduce costs, promote innovation, ensure interoperability between different devices and services, and help companies to access markets.
To support EU product legislation, the Commission can request the development of European harmonised standards to facilitate compliance by manufacturers of the relevant requirements. Once agreed and referenced in the Official Journal of the European Union, these harmonised standards become part of EU law and allow companies an easy and direct access to the internal market for their products, while ensuring a high degree of safety for users and consumers.
European legislation for medical devices also relies on harmonised standards. In particular, under the three current directives on medical devices, there are about 300 harmonised standards conferring presumption of conformity with the legal essential requirements. The Commission and the concerned European standardisation organisations (CEN and CENELEC) continuously work together to update and improve the set of harmonised standards available to economic operators in the EU. In such a common effort to face the coronavirus pandemic, the Commission, CEN and CENELEC have agreed to make a number of harmonised standards for important medical protective equipment like face masks and single-use gloves freely available to those companies that are willing to start producing these items.
Compliments of the European Commission.

On March 24, 2020, the U.S. Department of Labor released an initial set of questions and answers (Q&As) concerning the recently enacted Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA). The Q&As focus on the law’s provisions relating to new emergency paid sick leave (EPSL) and emergency paid Family and Medical Leave Act benefits (FMLA+). As it continues to accept feedback regarding the FFCRA, the DOL may release additional Q&As on more issues, or clarify issues in the existing guidance, before the law takes effect on April 1, 2020. LEARN MORE
AUTHORS:
• Jim Paretti, Jeff Nowak, Alexis Knapp, Sebastian Chilco, and Michael J. Lotito
Compliments of Littler Mendelson – a member of the EACCNY.

March 19, 2020
With the outbreak of COVID-19, we have seen the proliferation of significant quantities of news, myths, and disinformation about it – coming from various sources both within and outside of the European Union. The World Health Organisation has stated that the outbreak of and response to COVID-19 has been accompanied by a massive “infodemic”, which the WHO describes as an over-abundance of information – some accurate and some not – rendering it difficult to find trustworthy sources of information and reliable guidance.
Today, the information environment around the coronavirus is characterised by an immense amount of content from different sources and on different media. Governments and health authorities are trying to provide authoritative information about COVID-19 and social media platforms are looking for effective ways to promote this content, while simultaneously demoting or removing unreliable content. At the same time, we are witnessing a substantive amount of both misinformation and disinformation spreading on- and offline. While misinformation involves the unintentional spread of false information, disinformation campaigns entail the intentional production and/or dissemination of verifiably false content, spread either for political or financial reasons.
CONTINUE READING…
Compliments of the EEAS.

23/03/2020 – 18:22
COVID-19 will reshape our world. We don’t yet know when the crisis will end. But we can be sure that by the time it does, our world will look very different. How different will depend on the choices we make today.
“COVID-10 will reshape our world. We don’t yet know when the crisis will end. But we can be sure that by the time it does, our world will look very different.” – Josep Borrell, 
The COVID-19 crisis is not a war but it is ‘war-like’ in that it requires the mobilisation and direction of resources at unprecedented levels. Solidarity between countries and a readiness to make sacrifices for the common good are decisive. Only by pulling together and cooperating across borders can we beat the virus and contain its consequences – and the EU has a central role to play. This was the clear and united position of EU Foreign Ministers when we discussed the crisis on 23 March via video-link.
It is sometimes said that wars are won not by tactics or even strategy, but by logistics and communications. This seems true for COVID-19 as well: whoever is best at organising the response, quickly drawing on lessons learnt from around the world and communicating successfully towards citizens and the wider world, will come out strongest.
There is a global battle of narratives going on in which timing is a crucial factor. In January, the dominant framing was of this being a local crisis in Hubei province, aggravated by the cover up of crucial information by Chinese party officials. Europe was sending a lot of medical equipment to help Chinese authorities that were overwhelmed at the time. Since then, China has brought down local new infections to single figures – and it is now sending equipment and doctors to Europe, as others do as well. China is aggressively pushing the message that, unlike the US, it is a responsible and reliable partner. In the battle of narratives we have also seen attempts to discredit the EU as such and some instances where Europeans have been stigmatised as if all were carriers of the virus.
The point for Europe is this: we can be sure that perceptions will change again as the outbreak and our response to it evolves. But we must be aware there is a geo-political component including a struggle for influence through spinning and the ‘politics of generosity’. Armed with facts, we need to defend Europe against its detractors.
There is also a battle of narratives within Europe. It is vital that the EU shows it is a Union that protects and that solidarity is not an empty phrase. After the first wave in which national authorities took centre stage, now the EU is coming to the fore with joint actions on all tracks where member states have empowered it to act: with joint procurement of vital medical equipment, with a joint economic stimulus and a necessary relaxation of fiscal and state aid rules.
In addition, the EU’s role contains a big external component. We are assisting member states with their consular efforts, helping to bring stranded Europeans back home. For example, in the past week, joint efforts in Morocco enabled the repatriation of around 30.000 EU citizens. This shows that we can deliver together. 
Much more remains to be done. Worldwide, around 100,000 European travellers have registered at local embassies or consulates but the true figure of those that need to come home lies much higher.
A global pandemic needs global solutions and the EU has to be at the centre of the fight.  I am in touch with partners around the world, from Asia, Latin America and Africa, to help build a coordinated international response. In a crisis, the human instinct is often to turn inwards, to close borders and fend for yourself. While understandable, this stance is self-defeating. The COVID-19 emergency cannot be solved within one country, or by going it alone. Doing so simply means all of us will struggle longer, with higher human and economic costs.
What we should work for instead is a radical scaling up of international cooperation among scientists, economists and policy-makers. At the UN, the WHO and the IMF. Within the G7 and G20 and other international fora. Pooling resources to work on treatments and a vaccine. Limiting the economic damage by coordinating fiscal and monetary stimulus measures and keeping trade in goods open. Collaborating on re-opening borders when scientists tell us that we can. And fighting on-line disinformation campaigns. This is a time for solidarity and cooperation, not blame games which will not heal a single infected person.
While the needs are great at home, the EU should also be ready to assist others in fragile situations who risk being overwhelmed. Just think of the refugee camps in Syria and what would happen if COVID19 broke out there to people who have already suffered so much. In this respect Africa is a major concern. With Ebola it may have built more recent experience with handling pandemics than Europe, but health systems overall are very weak and a full outbreak would wreak havoc. Social distancing and living in confinement is exponentially more difficult in densely populated urban areas of Africa. Millions in Africa make their living in the informal economy and will have to handle the outbreak without any social safety net. Even before the virus has hit the continent, Africans, with other emerging economies, have to deal with a massive level of capital withdrawal. 
Elsewhere countries like Venezuela or Iran may well collapse without our support. This means we should ensure they have access to IMF assistance. And with Iran, we need to make sure that legitimate humanitarian trade can proceed despite US sanctions.
We should also remember that none of the other problems that we focused on before the corona-crisis, has gone away. In fact, they may get worse. COVID-19 may well deepen some of the longer running conflicts in the neighbourhood. As Europe we already had to navigate a world of growing geo-political tensions, especially between the US and China. Here too, the risk is that COVID-19 will compound pre-existing trends.
Overall the task for the EU is to defy the critics and demonstrate in very concrete terms that it is effective and responsible in times of crisis. Jean Monnet wrote in his memoirs that “Europe will be forged in crises, and will be the sum of the solutions adopted for those crises.” Let that be our guiding philosophy as we battle this crisis and prepare for what comes after.
Compliments of the EEAS. 

Commits policy support, saying efforts must have “Ambition of Marshall Plan, vision of New Deal”
21/03/2020 – OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurría called today for sweeping joint action by governments to defeat the health, economic, and social threats of the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic.  In calling on governments to better coordinate their efforts, Gurría announced that the OECD would channel its efforts into immediate support to policymakers combating the crisis, launching a new online policy hub immediately.
“The coronavirus pandemic is a public health crisis without precedent in living memory, and it is also setting in motion a major economic crisis. It looks increasingly likely that we will see sequential declines in global GDP or regional GDPs in the current and next quarters of 2020, and we must act now to avoid a protracted recession,” Mr Gurría said. “Only a sizeable, credible, internationally co-ordinated effort can deal with the immediate public health emergency, buffer the economic shock and develop a path towards recovery. We must take special care to support the most vulnerable in their health and their daily lives. Everything must be done to earn the confidence of citizens, who felt the weaknesses in our economies before all this began.”
In a statement, Mr Gurría called for immediate policy action in four specific areas:
Responding to the health challenge: Scientific effort must be complemented by regulatory and other measures to ensure that vaccines and treatments are developed, produced, and deployed as quickly as possible. 
Shoring up the economy: Governments should cushion immediate negative impacts with coordinated spending across sectors such as:
Health care: to cover extensive testing; treatment for all patients, regardless of whether they are insured or not; support to health-care workers; return of health-care retirees, while protecting high-risk groups; the enhanced provision of masks, ICUs and respirators, among others;
People: to cover short-term employment schemes, reduced requirements to benefit from unemployment insurance, cash transfers to the self-employed and support to the most vulnerable;
Firms: to cover charges and tax payment delays, temporary VAT reductions or deferrals, enhanced access to working capital through credit lines or state guarantees, special support packages for SMEs, especially those in services and tourism.

Combining efforts for financial regulation and supervision: Building on action underway by Central Banks, co-ordinated monitoring, diagnosis of emerging strains and coherent regulatory action will produce more positive results.
Restoring confidence: Addressing trade tensions, high corporate debt, and economic inequalities that deepen danger for the most vulnerable will help to resolve underlying weaknesses exacerbating the shock.
Read the full statement.
The OECD platform launched in response to the crisis will provide timely and comprehensive information on policy responses in countries around the world, together with OECD advice. Policy briefs will cover a range of subjects – from vaccines to education to taxes and small business – to help governments learn from each other and coordinate in real time”. 
“This is the third and greatest economic, financial and social shock of the 21st century, and it demands a modern, global effort akin to the last century’s Marshall Plan and New Deal – combined,” said Mr Gurría. “That effort must focus especially on those who were already in physical, economic and social precarity, and strengthen the foundation for our common future. As governments accelerate this work, multilateral action will make their initiatives far more effective than if countries continue to act alone.”
Mr Gurría announced that despite the challenges to economic forecasting posed by the changing crisis, the OECD will continue to update and share its analysis regularly as part of its policy support.
Compliments of the OECD.

The European Parliament is mobilising additional funds to help the EU countries hardest hit by the coronavirus pandemic.

In an extraordinary plenary session on Thursday 26 March, MEPs will vote on a European Commission proposal to allow member states to request financial assistance from the EU Solidarity Fund in their fight against Covid-19. The proposal is part of a set of EU measures to mobilise all existing budget resources to help EU countries tackle the pandemic.
The Commission proposes to broaden the Solidarity Fund’s scope to add major public health crises to the natural emergencies initially covered.
The hardest hit member states should get access to financial support of up to €800 million in 2020. Support would be decided on a case-by-case basis.
EU solidarity
Created as a reaction to the severe floods in Central Europe in 2002, the EU Solidarity Fund’s main objective is to provide financial assistance to EU member states dealing with natural disasters. Under the current rules, the fund can only support the recovery from disasters such as floods, forest fires, earthquakes, storms and droughts. Public health emergencies such as Covid-19 do not fall within its remit.
Under the new rules, public emergency and recovery operations, such as restoring the working order of infrastructures, cleaning up of areas and providing temporary accommodation for people, remain eligible for financing. The rules would be extended to cover assistance to the population in case of health crises and to cover measures to contain infectious diseases.
Find out more: Legislative procedure
Compliments of the European Parliament.

Last Updated: March 19, 2020
As announced by Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva on March 4, 2020, The IMF stands ready to support vulnerable countries with different lending facilities, including through rapid-disbursing emergency financing, which could amount up to $50 billion for low-income and emerging markets. Of this, $10 billion is available at zero interest for the poorest members through the Rapid Credit Facility.

What lending instruments does the IMF have to provide emergency financing to address coronavirus?
The IMF has two facilities—the Rapid Credit Facility (RCF) created in 2009 and Rapid Financing Instrument (RFI) set up in 2011— that provide emergency financial assistance to member countries without the need to have a full-fledged program in place. These loans can be disbursed very quickly to assist member countries implement policies to address emergencies such as the coronavirus.
Financing under the RCF is available to low income countries. It carries a zero interest rate, has a grace period of 5½ years, and a final maturity of 10. Members have used this facility 29 times, including last year for Mozambique in the wake of Cyclone Idai and in 2014-15 for Guinea and Liberia to confront the Ebola outbreak. Financial assistance provided under the RFI is subject to the same financing terms as the  Stand-By Arrangement (interest rates are currently about 1½ percent), and should be repaid within 3¼ to 5 years. Members have used this facility five times  – for instance, in 2016, the IMF provided an RFI emergency loan to Ecuador after one of the strongest earthquakes in decades.

What is the breakdown of $50 billion emergency financing available under IMF facilities?
Under both the RCF and RFI facilities, member countries can draw up to 50 percent of their quota—their share in the IMF’s capital. Total emergency lending to low income countries available under the emergency financing facilities is $10 billion. For emerging markets, we looked at those member countries markets that could potentially approach us for financial support and excluded those who have ample reserves, steady access to the financial markets, or existing IMF precautionary facilities such as Mexico. Emergency financing available for this group would amount to $40 billion.
The total number of countries with access of up to $50 billion under these two facilities or augmentation of existing arrangements is about 130. In both cases, we have excluded members that either have arrears to the Fund and/or World Bank or where we have assessed the debt situation to be unsustainable. The Fund is prevented by its policies to lend in such circumstances.

Who exactly within the countries receives the funds?
The balance of payment needs emerging from coronavirus could come from different sources, including direct health expenditure and economic spillovers. The funds are lent to the authorities (government or central bank).

The IMF Managing Director mentioned in her blog that many countries have expressed interest in help from the IMF. Are these countries expressing interest in the regular IMF programs, or in the $50 billion in emergency funding announced by the MD earlier this month? Or is it a combination of the two types of financing?
The countries that have expressed interest in financing are a mix of countries, some of which currently have programs and some don’t currently have programs but are looking for rapid financing.
Expressing an interest does not necessarily mean a formal request has been made but that countries are discussing options for assistance. The most logical option for many of these countries would be to explore the emergency financing facilities under which MD Georgieva said $50 billion in financing would be available.

What are the requirements for countries to qualify for the US$50 bn available resources to help tackle the Coronavirus related impacts? Can any member country apply? What about countries under programs at the moment? What about countries who are undergoing debt restructuring processes to re-establish debt sustainability?
Any IMF member may apply. There are some requirements for support under the RCF and RFI emergency financing instruments,including that the county’s debt is sustainable or on track to be sustainable, that it has urgent balance of payments needs, and that it is pursuing appropriate policies to address the crisis.
For countries that have existing Fund arrangements in place, it may be appropriate to augment the arrangements, or in cases where that may not be feasible to do on a timely basis, they may request support under the RCF or RFI.
As noted, a country’s debt needs to be considered sustainable or on track to be sustainable for the Fund to provide support. We take into account any debt restructuring operation underway and its prospects for success, which underscores the importance of every stakeholder making an effort to support countries in distress.

Can you explain the process and timeline when a country makes a formal request for the US$50 bn available resources?
After a country has formally requested support, staff will assess qualification requirements, work with the authorities to prepare a letter of intent, and prepare a staff report for the IMF Executive Board.

How quickly could we see financial assistance to them?
We are expediting members’ requests, but the speed of disbursements depends very much on individual circumstances.

Are the existing US$ 50 billion financing facilities enough in light of the recent developments?
The $50 billion provides an order of magnitude for possible requests for our rapid financing facilities; the Fund’s total lending resources amount to about $1 trillion. 

Could you remind us how the IMF can mobilize $1 trillion?
Resources for IMF loans to its members on non-concessional terms are provided by member countries, primarily through their payment of quotas. Multilateral and bilateral borrowing serve as a second and third line of defense, respectively, by providing a temporary supplement to quota resources. These borrowed resources played a critical role in enabling the IMF to support its member countries during the global economic crisis.
The IMF’s current total resources amounting to about SDR 975 billion translate into a capacity for lending or “firepower” of about SDR 715 billion (around US$ 1 trillion), after setting aside a liquidity buffer and considering that only resources of members with strong external position are used for lending.
For more information, please see factsheet “Where the IMF Gets Its Money”: https://www.imf.org/en/About/Factsheets/Where-the-IMF-Gets-Its-Money

Will an increase of the total US$1 trillion firepower be needed? Is this being discussed?
The IMF is well resourced to meet the financing requests of its member countries, and we stand ready to deploy our balance sheet to assist our member countries in this difficult time.
Compliments of the International Monetary Fund.

The European Commission has adopted a Temporary Framework to enable Member States to use the full flexibility foreseen under State aid rules to support the economy in the context of the COVID-19 outbreak. Together with many other support measures that can be used by Member States under the existing State aid rules, the Temporary Framework enables Member States to ensure that sufficient liquidity remains available to businesses of all types and to preserve the continuity of economic activity during and after the COVID-19 outbreak.
Executive Vice President Margrethe Vestager, in charge of competition policy, said: “The economic impact of the COVID-19 outbreak is severe. We need to act fast to manage the impact as much as we can. And we need to act in a coordinated manner. This new Temporary Framework enables Member States to use the full flexibility foreseen under State aid rules to support the economy at this difficult time.”
The State aid Temporary Framework to support the economy in the context of the COVID-19 outbreak, based on Article 107(3)(b) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, recognises that the entire EU economy is experiencing a serious disturbance. To remedy that, the Temporary Framework provides for five types of aid:
(i)  Direct grants, selective tax advantages and advance payments: Member States will be able to set up schemes to grant up to €800,000 to a company to address its urgent liquidity needs.
(ii)  State guarantees for loans taken by companies from banks: Member States will be able to provide State guarantees to ensure banks keep providing loans to the customers who need them.
(iii) Subsidised public loans to companies: Member States will be able to grant loans with favourable interest rates to companies. These loans can help businesses cover immediate working capital and investment needs.
(iv) Safeguards for banks that channel State aid to the real economy: Some Member States plan to build on banks’ existing lending capacities, and use them as a channel for support to businesses – in particular to small and medium-sized companies. The Framework makes clear that such aid is considered as direct aid to the banks’ customers, not to the banks themselves, and gives guidance on how to ensure minimal distortion of competition between banks.
(v) Short-term export credit insurance: The Framework introduces additional flexibility on how to demonstrate that certain countries are not-marketable risks, thereby enabling short-term export credit insurance to be provided by the State where needed.
Given the limited size of the EU budget, the main response will come from Member States’ national budgets. The Temporary Framework will help target support to the economy, while limiting negative consequences to the level playing field in the Single Market.
The Temporary Framework therefore includes a number of safeguards. For example, It links the subsidised loans or guarantees to businesses to the scale of their economic activity, by reference to their wage bill, turnover, or liquidity needs, and to the use of the public support for working or investment capital. The aid should therefore help businesses to weather the downturn and to prepare a sustainable recovery.
The Temporary Framework complements the many other possibilities already available to Member States to mitigate the socio-economic impact of the COVID-19 outbreak, in line with EU State aid rules. On 13 March 2020, the Commission adopted a Communication on a Coordinated economic response to the COVID-19 outbreak setting out these possibilities. For example, Member States can make generally applicable changes in favour of businesses (e.g. deferring taxes, or subsidising short-time work across all sectors), which fall outside State Aid rules. They can also grant compensation to companies for damage suffered due to and directly caused by the COVID-19 outbreak. This can be useful to support particularly impacted sectors, such as transport, tourism, hospitality and retail.
The Framework will be in place until the end of December 2020. With a view to ensuring legal certainty, the Commission will assess before that date if it needs to be extended.
Background
State aid rules enable Member States to take swift and effective action to support citizens and companies, in particular SMEs, facing economic difficulties due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
The Temporary Framework adopted today complements the ample possibilities for Member States to design measures in line with existing EU State aid rules, as set out in the Communication on a Coordinated economic response to the COVID-19 outbreak of 13 March 2020. In particular, they can adopt measures that fall outside the scope of State aid control, such as national funds granted to health services or other public services to tackle the Covid-19. Member States can also immediately act through public support measures that are available to all companies such as wage subsidies, suspension of payments of corporate and value added taxes or social contributions. In addition, Member States can grant financial support directly to consumers, for example for cancelled services or tickets that are not reimbursed by the operators concerned.
In addition, EU State aid rules enable Member States to help companies cope with liquidity shortages and needing urgent rescue aid. Article 107(2)(b) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union enables Member States to compensate companies for the damage directly caused by exceptional occurrences, such as those caused by the COVID-19 outbreak, including measures in sectors such as aviation and tourism.
The Commission had adopted a Temporary Framework in 2008, in response to the global financial crisis.
For More Information
Communication from the Commission – Temporary Framework for State aid measures to support the economy in the current COVID-19 outbreak
 
Compliments of the European Commission.

Please see below a a press release from the European Central Bank (ECB):
• ECB and other major central banks to offer 7-day US dollar operations on a daily basis
• Operations with 84-day maturity continue to be offered weekly
• New frequency effective as of 23 March 2020, to remain in place for as long as appropriate to support smooth functioning of US dollar funding markets
The Bank of Canada, the Bank of England, the Bank of Japan, the European Central Bank, the Federal Reserve, and the Swiss National Bank are today announcing a coordinated action to further enhance the provision of liquidity via the standing US dollar liquidity swap line arrangements.
To improve the swap lines’ effectiveness in providing US dollar funding, these central banks have agreed to increase the frequency of 7-day maturity operations from weekly to daily. These daily operations will commence on Monday, 23 March 2020, and will continue at least through the end of April. The central banks also will continue to hold weekly 84-day maturity operations.
The swap lines among these central banks are available standing facilities and serve as an important liquidity backstop to ease strains in global funding markets, thereby helping to mitigate the effects of such strains on the supply of credit to households and businesses, both domestically and abroad.
Compliments of the ECB.