ECB's Draghi wary of both crisis action and exit strategy

FRANKFURT — The banker now in charge of rescuing the euro wants his top staff to take Sundays off. Mario Draghi, president of the European Central Bank, eschews long meetings and refrains from lecturing his colleagues, senior ECB officials say. Until Draghi took over a year ago, insiders say, the bank had a workaholic, micro-managed regime. But even as the Italian has proved ready to intervene in the markets and try policies that would have been unthinkable a few years ago, he has brought a freer, more hands-off culture to the bank.

The European Central Bank is prepared to cut off funding to Cyprus and let the Mediterranean island succumb to financial meltdown if it has to, confident it has unlimited firepower to protect the rest of the eurozone. Cyprus propelled the 17-nation bloc into uncharted waters on Tuesday by rejecting a proposed levy on bank deposits as a condition of a 10-billion euro (US$12.9-billion) EU bailout. Without the aid, much of it to recapitalize Cypriot banks, the ECB says they will be insolvent, and it requires banks to be solvent for them to receive central bank support.

Even though the German constitutional court gave its blessing to ECB president Mario Draghi's OMT program, Concerns Mount that ECB Bond-Buying Program Is Illegal.

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Central Bank is con