Countries will not use it until they have to, as illustrated by comments from an Italian minister this morning. While the EU is trying to get Spain to take the cash before crisis strikes (again), politicians are loath to sign up for reforms and cede sovereignty to outsiders until they are backed into a corner.
Yields will likely be kept somewhat lower than they might have been owing to the treat of an ECB “put” for Spain and Italy, but crisis will not be forestalled because the ECB has an unloaded bazooka in its arsenal.
Sovereigns best use this interregnum to get their fiscal houses in order, but what are the odds of that? Not good, in my view. It is way to early to call the program a bust but not too early to note its flaws.