FACTBOX - Governments act to relieve financial crisis

Fri Oct 10, 2008 11:53am BST
 
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(Reuters) - Following are the latest measures taken by governments to limit damage from the financial crisis:

* AUSTRALIA - The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) injected A$2.63 billion ($1.8 billion) into the banking system on Friday.

The RBA provided banks with funding for up to a year on Thursday, extending the length of loans.

* NETHERLANDS - The Dutch government said it would set aside 20 billion euros ($27.5 billion) of capital to protect the country's financial companies.

* RUSSIA - Russia's lower house of parliament, the Duma, approved two anti-crisis packages worth a total of $86 billion. The packages made available $50 billion of state money to banks and companies who need to refinance foreign debt, and 950 billion roubles ($36.31 billion) to Russia's main banks in subordinated loans.

RECENT GOVERNMENT MOVES:

* AUSTRIA - Austria said on Wednesday it would give an unlimited guarantee on bank deposits of savers.

* BRITAIN - Britain said on Wednesday it would make 50 billion pounds ($87 billion) of new capital immediately available to retail banks and would extend 250 billion pounds in guarantees to help them refinance senior debt.

-- In unison with other major central banks, the Bank of England cut interest rates by half a percentage point. The unscheduled cut to 4.5 percent was the biggest for seven years.  Continued...

 
Detail showing a commercial U.S. Dollar rate against British Sterling is displayed in central London in this file photo December 1, 2006.  REUTERS/Toby Melville
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