The European Central Bank is unlikely to escape its role as reluctant bond buyer anytime soon.
This week, the central bank finally gave the market what it yearned for: purchasing Italian and Spanish sovereign debt. The move was a controversial extension of a policy credited with quelling selling pressure on the bonds of financially strapped Ireland, Portugal and Greece.
Yields on Italian and Spanish bonds have fallen, indicating the ECB has managed to inject some calm into trigger-happy markets. But the fact that it's buying bonds at all is indicative of how Europe's debt crisis is mutating.
The market is not yearning for Italian and Spanish bonds. That's the(ir) problem.
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