The OMT — um, what does this thing do again? A Bundesverfassungsgericht guide

Arguably, none of the below matters now.

That’s the prime effect of the German constitutional court turning to the European Court of Justice for a ruling on whether the ECB’s sovereign bond-buying programme is a “structurally significant transgression of powers” under European treaty law.

Big words. But the backing of the Bundesverfassungsgericht judges (pictured right) for that view gets rendered into just another opinion, pending the ECJ’s decision. And the arc of the ECJ’s justice is long, turgidly written, but ultimately quite friendly to pieces of bailout architecture that have an odd relationship to the treaties — as in past musings on the ESM.

But the really interesting thing is that regardless, the OMT’s purpose apparently remains almost completely lost on the court.