Bernanke offers only light relief as FIG widens

With Wednesday's Federal Open Market Committee meeting finally out of the way, banks can get back to looking at their secondary levels and seeing if a primary deal makes economic sense. But with investors pricing in fears sparked by Fed chairman Ben Bernanke's confirmation of plans to reduce the US government's asset purchase programme this year, with a view to ending it altogether in 2014, bankers worry that for many borrowers the answer to that question will be no.