The ECB kept the interest rate unchanged and announced the plan to purchase sovereign bond through the new program called Outright Monetary Transactions or OMT. It also decided to eliminate credit rating threshold on all debt issued or guaranteed by the central governments in the euro area with the exception of Greece. Similar securities denominated in USD, GBP and YEN will also qualify. Effectively it’s saying that banks don’t have to worry about further downgrades on sovereigns in the euro area and they can use their holdings to US Treasuries, Gilts and JGBs to borrow from the ECB. Overall market reacted very positively even though what came out was largely in line with expectation. Spanish and Italian government bond yields edged slightly lower. Euro Stoxx popped 3.4%, the CAC 40 gained 3.06% and the DAX finished up 2.91%. Here in the US, treasuries fell and the S&P 500 reached the best level since Jan 2008. twitter @FNNOnline or check us out at our website at fnno.com.