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| - Amid the global cash crunch caused by the coronavirus pandemic, the US Federal Reserve on Thursday opened a facility to provide dollars to more central banks, including Brazil and Mexico. Emerging markets have been particularly hard hit by an outflow of funds during the crisis that has shut down huge swaths of the global economy. The Fed said the move aims to "lessen strains in global US dollar funding markets, thereby mitigating the effects of these strains on the supply of credit to households and businesses, both domestically and abroad." The Fed will provide up to $60 billion each to the central banks of Australia, Brazil, South Korea, Mexico, Singapore and Sweden, and $30 billion each to Denmark, Norway and New Zealand. The facility, known as swap lines, will be in place for at least six months, allowing foreign central banks to exchange domestic currency for US dollars. The Fed already has standing swap lines with the Bank of Canada, the Bank of England, the Bank of Japan, the European Central Bank, and the Swiss National Bank. Robin Brooks, chief economist at the Institute for International Finance, has been calling for swap lines for emerging market economies that have faced a "sudden stop" of capital flows amid the uncertainty and the collapse of their currency's value. These factors traditionally have been associated with a 7-10 percent economic contraction. "The growth cost to (emerging markets) from what's going is unfortunately immense," he said, adding he predicted a slowdown in global growth to 1.2 percent with the US, eurozone and Japan in recession. hs/cs
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