The banking sector provides little in the way of financing for women's enterprises and, when it does so, funding is generally advanced through a domiciliary line of credit.

Banking failure caused a credit crunch.

Credit lines secured by home equity provided another new way to finance spending.

As a result, bank credit will be harder to obtain.

Local governments rely on bank credit to invest in infrastructure and real estate development.

Using bank credits to speculate in equity and housing markets is still mostly forbidden.

Credit easing and support of the banking system helped significantly by preventing much worse.

The banking system of Azerbaijan consists of the Central Bank of Azerbaijan, commercial banks and non banking credit organizations.

It moved quickly to establish a fast disbursing emergency line of credit for countries with reasonable policies.

Here, with input from South Korea, it is developing plans for a Precautionary Credit Line (PCL).

In the last two years, bank credit has become the main source of capital in China a risky situation, given the low quality and inadequacy of bank capital.

The Fund is also hoping to establish a new Global Stabilization Mechanism to provide credit lines to regional groupings (like the EU).

Countries qualifying for a PCL would have to meet some, but relatively minimal and unobtrusive, conditions.

Credit lines should be kept open to smaller businesses, which employ the bulk of the world s workers but have the least access to credit.

This may result in extra reserves, which commercial banks cannot use to extend their credit lines.

As a result, the volume of bank credits financing local investments increased six fold in 2009 alone.

Many of them have jobs that require them to dip into credit lines just to stay afloat.

Unfortunately, only three countries Mexico, Colombia, and Poland have signed up for an FCL.

In the last few years, 30 40 of bank credits went to government infrastructure projects.

Indeed, it is increasingly common for banks off balance sheet lending to exceed newly issued balance sheet credit.

Governments should encourage the banking sector to provide credit to SMEs, for example through fiscal incentives.

The eurozone banking system is becoming balkanized, as cross border and interbank credit lines are cut off, and capital flight could turn into a full run on periphery banks if, as is likely, Greece stages a disorderly euro exit in the next few months.

The investment loans and massive debts among local financing platforms, together with the off record credit channeled through the shadow banking system, are increasing the risk that non performing loans will soon shake the banking sector.

Augmenting an FCL for countries with impeccably strong policies with a PCL for countries with reasonably strong policies might break this deadlock.

This is true for the banking system, which has not de leveraged to the satisfaction of either regulators or the markets, thus limiting the scope for credit growth.

Moreover, the country benefits from strong public finances, prudent monetary policy, sustainable debt dynamics, a sound banking system, and well functioning credit markets.

So far, the strategy of maintaining banking systems on feeding tubes of taxpayer guaranteed short term credit has made sense.

For example, since 2008, when the central authorities tried to boost growth to combat the global crisis, local governments expanded their investment capacity through shadow banking vehicles that sought to circumvent restraints on bank credit.

The European Central Bank has provided a monetary lifeline that has provided much needed liquidity within the financial system and helped the government to stem the crisis of confidence created by the banking collapse.

Those who borrowed recklessly during China s credit boom are not small private firms or average consumers (household indebtedness in China is very low), but local governments, SOEs, and well connected real estate developers (many of them family members of government officials).

In just 10 years, the share of state directed bank lending in China has fallen from 92 of new credit creation to less than half.

Moreover, roughly 40 of the increase in bank credit in 2009 accommodated the fiscal expansion, as projects were started prior to the budget allocations needed to finance them.

The credit crunch in the banking system is becoming more severe as banks deleverage by selling assets and rationing credit, exacerbating the downturn.

With most credit pipelines already partly blocked, the shortage of corporate credit will become more severe as regulators finally force banks to embark on a proper mobilization of prudential capital and shrink balance sheets to less risky levels.

The collapse of credit in the global financial system is having an even more devastating effect on the countries of the periphery than those at the center. Credit lines are withdrawn, maturing loans cannot be rolled over and trade finance has dried up.

On August 30, the Fund abolished ceilings on its Flexible Credit Line facility, which was introduced in 2009 to provide rapid funds to countries in temporary crisis.

The goal should be to make self insurance unnecessary by guaranteeing access to international credit lines in case of abrupt outflows of private capital.

The IMF took steps in this direction in March, particularly by creating the Flexible Credit Line for crisis prevention purposes, as well as expanding other credit lines and overhauling conditionality (relying more on ex ante conditionality and eliminating structural performance criteria).

Credit Where Credit is Due

Indeed, the rapid expansion of bank credit needed to finance skyrocketing government led investment is increasing the amount of liquidity in China s financial system.

Niemeyer drew straight by drawing crooked lines.

Fortunately, larger companies are now less dependent on bank credit than they were in the past, thanks to a well developed market for commercial paper that in effect bypasses traditional bank loans.

In recent years, the central government has tightened its control over the banking sector, undermining the financial system s development, not least by impeding banks ability to assess credit risk.

And you'll see there is a line, a faint line going across that image.

This breakdown suggests that the 8 trillion cushion would be sufficient to offset potential losses arising from higher risk credit in China s commercial banking sector.