Eurozone banking sector is on the mend, shows ECB survey

Frankfurt

EUROPE'S battered financial sector is showing further signs of mending and banks are increasingly competing for customers by easing credit standards, a key European Central Bank (ECB) survey showed on Tuesday.

The ECB said its quarterly bank lending survey (BLS) showed banks are easing credit standards for loans to enterprises, an encouraging sign, since the chronic weakness of credit activity in the euro area has previously been blamed for the absence of any noticeable recovery in the 19 countries that share the single currency.