Data Extraction

No amount/estimate: April, To support liquidity, the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) will conduct one-month and three-month repo operations daily until further notice.

No amount/estimate: April, The exchange rate has been allowed to adjust flexibly to absorb economic shocks.

(i) April, The government is allocating up to AUD15 billion to invest in residential mortgage-backed securities and asset-backed securities to help funding for small banks and non-bank financial institutions (See Measure 9: No breakdown); (ii) To allow banks to lend more to small and medium enterprises (SMEs) during the period of disruption caused by COVID-19, RBA has established a Term Funding Facility (TFF) of at least AUD90 billion for SMEs lending (TFF will offer three-year funding to authorized deposit-taking institutions [ADIs]).

No amount/estimate: (i) March 3 and 19, The policy rate was cut by 25 basis points twice to 0.25%; (ii) The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) has (a) provided temporary relief from its capital requirement, allowing banks to utilize some of their current large buffers to facilitate ongoing lending to the economy as long as minimum capital requirements are met, and (b) March 30, announced that it is deferring its scheduled implementation of the Basel III reforms in Australia by one year to January 2023.

April, Under a new Coronavirus SME Guarantee Scheme, the Government will guarantee 50% of new loans issued by eligible lenders to SMEs with total lending capacity of AUD40 billion (2% of GDP) (AUD20 billion of the total AUD40 biilion is lumped in the AUD194 billion package. See Measure 9: No breakdown).

April, The Commonwealth government has (i) committed to spend almost an extra AUD5 billion (0.3% of GDP) to strengthen the health system and protect the vulnerable people, including those in aged care, from the outbreak of COVID-19; and (ii) introduced temporary measures to ensure the continuity of aged care, amounting to an additional AUD544.6 million.

April: (i) AUD194 billion (9.7% of GDP) support on measures including (a) wage subsidies (6.7% of GDP), (b) income support to households, (c) cash flow support to businesses, (d) investment incentives, (e) targeted measures for affected regions and industries, and (f) an advance authorization of AUD40 billion for unforeseen events. (See Measure 9: No breakdown); (ii) State and territory governments announced stimulus packages of a total of AUD11.5 billion (0.6% of GDP) including payroll tax relief for businesses and relief for households, such as (a) discount utility bills, (b) cash payments to vulnerable households, and (c) support for health spending; (iii) No amount/estimate: The Commonwealth government has committed to provide free childcare to around one million families and announced targeted support to the education system [update].

No amount/measure: (i) April, The RBA has announced yield targeting on 3-year government bonds at 0.25% through purchases of government bonds in the secondary market.

March 20, RBA has established a swap line with the United States (US) Federal Reserve for the provision of US dollar liquidity in amounts up to USD60 billion. Amount oustanding as of April 30, 2020: USD1.15billion.

April, Three economic stimulus packages, i.e., (i) support to individuals; (ii) support to businesses; and (iii) support to flow of credit are put in place at the Commonwealth level, with total expenditure and revenue measures of AUD194 billion (9.7% of GDP) through FY2023-24, the majority of which to be executed in FY2019-20 and FY2020-21 (See Measure 2: Actions that increase liabilities to the central bank or government and loan guarantees; and Measure 5: Direct support to income/revenue).

March: (i) Travel restrictions, screening travelers who arrive in Australia and ensuring they self-isolate on arrival, continuing with border surveillance; (ii) Enforcing social distancing measures, testing people suspected of the disease, and isolating people with the virus and their close contacts; (iii) Increasing of health system capacity; (iv) Delivering support to Australians experiencing domestic, family and sexual violence due to the fallout of coronavirus; (v) Putting limits on some prescription and over the counter medications, to make sure those who need them can access them.

The Oesterreichische Nationalbank (OeNB) has declared readiness to supply sufficient cash to banks, ATM operators, and the economy in response to increased withdrawals. Working hours were extended to meet the increased demand.

EUR9 billion in credit guarantees.

No amount/estimate: Austrians are allowed to defer interest payments on bank loans.