(Wall Street Journal) -- The Federal Reserve pumped a total $41bn (€28.3bn) to the US financial system in three separate operations Thursday, amounting to the largest injection of funds since the liquidity crisis took hold this summer.

The size of the injection may come as a surprise, coming just a day after the central bank delivered its second consecutive rate cut. Wednesday's 25 basis point cut, which brings the target rate to 4.5%, follows a half percentage-point drop in September, which was intended in part to help ease stubbornly high lending rates in the interbank market.