Regarding Greece, the ECB will stick to its stance presented in March. Greece will need to continue to resort to ELA financing of its banks (€65.6bn in February, expected to increase to €73bn mid-April), until further clarity is reached at the political level.
In March, the ECB clarified that countries under a programme would need to have a successful review before the ECB could buy bonds in these countries.
On the issue of reinstating the waiver on Greek government bonds for ECB collateral, Draghi clarified that there needs to be a "likelihood of a successful completion of a review", implying that the reforms outlined by the Greek government are not sufficient or sufficiently credible in the eyes of the ECB.
"Draghi might also reiterate that the ECB has provided more than €130bn already to Greece (€104bn to banks, €27bn to the government), representing some 73% of Greek GDP) and that rising T-bill purchases by Greek banks would be tantamount to indirect monetary financing, which is prohibited by the Treaty", says Societe Generale.
