The Euribor 3 month money is at 2.822% which means the margin on interbank money is now at 0.322% (the current base rate is 2.5%) over the base. The Credit Crunch by definition is a sudden reduction in the general availability of loans (or credit) or a sudden tightening of the conditions required to obtain a loan from the banks. One of the biggest hallmarks of the whole financial crisis was the disjointed relationship of the Euribor from the ECB.
Traditionally the Euribor (we are talking about the 3 month money generally) trailed the ECB at c. 0.1 to 0.2%, so if the ECB base rate was 4% then the Euribor was (approximately) 4.13% or something like that. In July of 2007 this all changed and margins on interbank lending shot through the roof, to such an extent that literally thousands of loans in Ireland alone turned into negative …