The European Central Bank expects banks to flock to its new ultra-long loan offering in September, regardless of the weak economic outlook for the euro zone, primarily because they need to refinance an earlier round of such borrowing. Whether the new funds will actually reach companies and households as intended by the ECB is less clear. Banks have until Thursday to submit lending reports to the ECB to determine how much they can borrow in September and December under the new four-year loan programme, called TLTROs, which aims to push banks to lend more to the real economy.     But ... (full story)