The bank did not say which countries’ debt it was buying, how much it would spend in the future, or whether it bought any corporate bonds. The 16.5 billion euros ($21 billion) was considered a relatively small amount for the market.
Analysts said the bank would want to keep investors guessing to maximize the psychological impact of the move.
The bank also announced steps to prevent the bond purchases from increasing the overall money supply and fueling inflation. The E.C.B. said it would take in a similar amount from banks, which will be able to deposit funds and earn interest.
Banks will submit bids for the interest rate they are willing to accept, with an annual rate of 1 percent as the upper limit for one-week deposits. The E.C.B.’s interest rate for overnight deposits is 0.25 percent.
The central bank took the controversial step of buying government bonds last week after signs that nervousness about the creditworthiness of Greece, Portugal and Spain was spreading to the banking system.
“A number of markets were no longer functioning correctly; it looked somewhat like the situation in mid-September 2008 after the Lehman Brothers’ bankruptcy,” Jean-Claude Trichet, the president of the E.C.B., told the newsmagazine Der Spiegel in an interview over the weekend.
Harvinder Sian, an analyst at the Royal Bank of Scotland, wrote in a note to investors that the prospect of unpredictable E.C.B. intervention would raise the risk for speculators who might want to bet against European government bonds.
He forecast that the interest rate that the E.C.B. would pay on the special deposits would be much lower than 1 percent, with banks willing to accept 0.3 percent interest or less in return for the haven.
Banks “will be very happy to give the E.C.B. excess cash,” Mr. Sian said.
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