Lorenzo Bini Smaghi, a member of the executive board at the European Central Bank, on Friday repeated his call on banks to use bumper profits to build up capital rather than splash out on bonuses.

Bini Smaghi told an audience in Milan that banks were meant to adapt to new capital requirements revealed by the Basel Committee last month by a capital increase, not reduced exposure to the real economy. That banks, as shown by the ECB's latest bank lending survey, also release Friday, were doing so