why we ’ re doing so, who we ’ re working with, and how much we ’ re paying for their services. it requires if we accelerate the vendor selection process to minimize time to market, we operate under a short - term contract and then open up the process to a competitive range of bidders, looking beyond the largest and most established players and providing broad access to a diverse range of smaller players. it means putting on our website the eligibility of borrowers and laying out the terms and conditions of the facilities as clearly as possible, along with posting faqs and providing opportunities to ask questions. and it means that we actively explore ways to go beyond what ’ s required by legislation and proactively report on the usage of the facilities as much as possible, subject to meeting our policy objectives. in terms of governance, we will embed the facilities into our existing infrastructure for controls, management, and oversight. we will proactively identify and address conflicts of interest – real or perceived – for anyone working on the facilities. personal investment guidelines will be refined as 3 / 4 bis central bankers'speeches needed, and rules will be clear on the gathering of market intelligence and handling sensitive information related to the facilities. good governance will also require balancing loss protection with financial stability goals, which requires integration of our risk management team into the full life - cycle of the facilities, from policy design to the eventual wind - down. as a concluding thought, we know the ultimate definition of success is accomplishing what we set out to do in support of the american economy. in pursuing this goal, we ’ ve been entrusted with a great responsibility to deploy large sums of public resources, and we have an obligation to the public to be accountable for all our actions. we look forward to engaging with our oversight bodies and those appointed under the cares act to ensure that the american people understand the steps we are taking on their behalf as faithful stewards of the public trust. 4 / 4 bis central bankers'speeches

grade corporate issuers relative to treasury securities increased by about 2. 5 percentage points in the first half of march, while issuance for companies rated below investment grade came to a halt. in this context, the primary market corporate credit facility ( pmccf ) was designed to provide funding for highly rated companies that need access to financing in order to maintain business operations during this period of dislocation. again with backing from the u. s. treasury, the federal reserve will create a funding vehicle to backstop eligible corporate borrowers for up to four years, at an interest rate that is better aligned with corporates ’ underlying credit risk than was available through market - based financing during march. this funding can be provided by the pmccf either through purchases of eligible corporate bonds as the sole investor at issuance, or from purchases of portions of syndications at issuance. the secondary market corporate credit facility ( smccf ), also backed by the u. s. treasury with funding from the federal reserve, will play an important complementary role to the pmccf. here again, there will be two mechanisms at work : the smccf may either purchase eligible corporate bonds with a remaining maturity of 5 years or less, or it can purchase u. s. - listed etfs. for etfs, the preponderance of holdings will be of etfs whose primary investment objective is exposure to u. s. investment - grade corporate bonds, and the remainder will be in etfs whose primary investment objective is exposure to u. s. high - yield corporate bonds. taken together, the corporate credit facilities will have three main objectives when we go live in the coming weeks : first, to provide broad support for market functioning in secondary markets to allow for orderly and timely risk transfer in corporate credit ; second, to support primary issuance for businesses at funding costs that better reflect normal liquidity conditions ; and third, to reduce the incidence and severity of fire sales and / or indiscriminate liquidation. municipal liquidity facility the last facility i ’ ll mention today is the municipal liquidity facility, which was designed to help 2 / 4 bis central bankers'speeches provide states, cities and counties with the funding needed to provide essential public services to their citizens. due to the virus outbreak, the municipal securities market has recently been under considerable strain as investors have become reluctant to purchase municipal securities. as a result, interest rates on municipal securities have increased significantly. at the same time, states