Four of the UK’s biggest financial institutions have raised record amounts of securities known as covered bonds in the private debt market since the end of April, collateral which has either been, or, potentially will be used to access the Bank of England’s special liquidity facility.

In under three months since the liquidity facility was introduced, UK banks HBOS, Barclays, Abbey and building society Nationwide have between them raised £30.5bn (€38.2bn) through covered bond private placements, collateral which can be used to swap with more liquid UK government securities under the facility.