purchased by the ecb to €1. 1 trillion in 2020. this is a large sum in order to maintain financial stability in the debt markets, in particular in the government bond markets, and to safeguard the monetary policy transmission mechanisms. in addition, of course, we have the fiscal policies of national governments and the european commission, as well as the decision by the eurogroup last week. do you think that the measures adopted last week by the eurogroup are enough to deal with the severity of the problem, or should the finance ministers have gone further? with coronabonds, for example, or similar solutions. the agreement made was a commitment that goes in the right direction. it ’ s important to remember that. to reach a compromise, everyone has to give way a little and to believe in it. the agreement is a sign of political commitment. as for other possible measures, such as coronabonds, the ecb has always been in favour of the existence of a fiscal instrument at european level that can complement monetary policy. it is just that this is a political decision. we are in favour of it, we think it would be a good thing for the euro area, but we will see what happens. the european council meets on 23 april. we consider it to be a useful instrument, but it is not up to the ecb. it ’ s for the european governments to decide. 1 / 3 bis central bankers'speeches and what do you expect will happen? do you think that it ’ s possible to reach a political agreement to take this step towards coronabonds or is it just a dream? i couldn ’ t possibly say what will happen. all i can say is that the current situation is difficult and that the commitment made by the eurogroup was positive, but let ’ s see. the possibility of a recovery fund being set up is a good idea. the size of the fund and how it is funded is left open to discussion. that ’ s why it depends on what the european governments decide. why did the ecb decide to launch a new programme, the pepp, just a few days after announcing that it was strengthening the previous programme. was your initial assessment of the situation too optimistic? within three or four days we saw a rapid deterioration in the situation. containment measures were taken in several countries, and we realised that the impact on the economy could be enormous, with repercussions on the financial markets. it was a swift reaction on our part

deal is available here. 3. see schnabel, i. ( 2020a ), “ never waste a crisis : covid - 19, climate change and monetary policy ”, 17 july. 4. see lagarde, c. ( 2021 ), “ towards a green capital markets union for europe ”, 6 may. see also panetta, f. ( 2021 ), “ sustainable finance : transforming finance to finance the transformation ”, 25 january. 5. banks seem to increasingly factor in climate - related risks, for example by pricing climate - related policy exposures in their loan portfolios and reducing lending to polluting companies and projects. see, for example, de greiff, k., delis, m. and ongena, s., ( 2018 ), “ being stranded on the carbon bubble? climate policy risk and the pricing of bank loans ”, discussion paper series, no. 12928, centre for economic policy research ( cepr ), may ; altunbas, y., marques, d., reghezza, a., rodrigues - acri, c., and spaggiari, m., ( 2020 ), “ do banks fuel climate change? ”, working papers series, ecb, forthcoming. 6. see de haas, r. and popov, a. ( 2021 ), “ finance and green growth ”, european banking center discussion paper series no 2018 - 001. 7. see flammer, c. ( 2021 ), “ corporate green bonds ”, journal of financial economics, pp. 20 – 39. however, evidence on the impact of green bonds on carbon emissions is mixed : other studies have found that the issuance of green bonds is not associated with a decrease in the carbon emissions at the firmlevel. see ehlers, t., mojon, b. and packer, f. ( 2020 ), “ green bonds and carbon emissions : exploring the case for a rating system at the firm level ”, bis quarterly review, september. 8. as stressed by ignazio visco at the recent green swan conference hosted by the bank for international settlements ( bis ), these externalities are particularly relevant as emissions entail spill - overs to other markets and countries. such spill - overs create an additional need for coordinating mitigation policies across countries to avoid undue delays in countering the effects of climate change. see visco, i.