Eight hundred banks have reached into the electronic vaults of the European Central Bank to borrow €530 billion in three-year term funding. The ECB announced the amount supplied under the funding facility last night.Two months ago the ECB provided €489 billion in three-year funding to 523 banks.Inter-bank interest rates have declined since the earlier round of funding, with the combined funding rounds credited with helping to shake off some of the gloom pervading financial markets for most of the second half of 2011. Data on the take up of funding by country was not published, though it will be in the coming weeks. In the meantime, numerous media outlets have been pursuing the major banks in an effort to clarify whether they borrowed from the ECB or not, with BBVA of Spain and Lloyds Banking Group of the UK two to confirm they did so.