Analysts in the City of London have returned from the Easter break entertaining the possibility that the European Central Bank will need to initiate a fresh round of cheap, three-year financing to stabilise the region, as flagged up by Financial News earlier this month.

Bankers told Financial News last week that they were preparing for a further ECB intervention following previous refinancing operations in December and February. PJ Bye, head of public sector debt syndication at HSBC, said at the time: "I don't see how the authorities are going to go from two €500bn LTROs to nothing."