Philip R. Lane: Euro liquidity lines and the international monetary system

The provision of liquidity is a basic task for a central bank. [ 1 ] The ECB injects liquidity through its refinancing operations (currently the main refinancing operations and the longer-term refinancing operations, with very long-term refinancing operations and targeted longer-term refinancing operations deployed in the past) and asset portfolios (previously built up under the asset purchase programme and the pandemic emergency purchase programme). [ 2 ] Since the ECB only has domestic counterparties in its refinancing operations, it is essential to complement the domestic liquidity framework with international liquidity lines.