ECB’s Constancio: IMF Needs More Resources

The International Monetary Fund needs more resources to tackle challenges in the global economy, not just Europe, European Central Bank vice-President Vitor Constancio said on Saturday.
Euro zone finance ministers raised the combined lending capacity of their two bailout funds to 700 billion euros from 500 billion on Friday after many G20 countries made a stronger euro zone firewall a pre-condition for committing more money to the IMF.

“These resources (for the IMF) would be for the general resources of the IMF, not for any specific fund or for any specific account for Europe,” Constancio told a news conference after a meeting of European Union finance ministers and central bank governors in Copenhagen.

“It is a recognition that, in general, for the world economy, the IMF needs to have more resources if we think … what in a future emergency situation could be the needs of the IMF to fulfill its role anywhere in the world,” he said.
Finance ministers from the world’s 20 biggest developing and developed economies, the G20, meet in April in Washington to discuss an increase of resources for the IMF. “That is very important to understand – this linkage with the European situation has in my view been overplayed and exaggerated by some,” Constancio said.