The European Central Bank (ECB) today took its most explicit move yet towards setting up a scheme to funnel liquidity into the eurozone's small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), by adjusting its rules on acceptable collateral to include asset-backed securities (ABS) with significantly lower credit ratings than at present.

The updated ‘risk control framework' will also see reduced haircuts on the marketable instruments. The headline move, however, is that "the list of collateral accepted under