After Lehman,central banks and the Financial Stability Board recognized the impossible nature of the repo trinity, attributing cyclical leverage, fire sales and elusive liquidity in collateral markets, including government bond markets, to free repo markets. Central banks, with the Bank of England leading the way, now accept that financial stability means supporting liquidity in collateral markets in times of stress rather than supporting banking institutions as in the traditional lender of last resort (LOLR) model. Paradoxically, LOLR support, implemented through repo loans, can destabilize (shadow) banks where central banks’ collateral framework follows collateral market valuations. The quiet revolution in crisis central banking that involves direct support for core markets may appear like, but does not entail a return to, fiscal dominance. Rather, it creates financial dominance, defined as asymmetric support for falling asset prices. While financial dominance should be addressed by direct regulatory interventions, the quest for biting repo rules has so far proved illusive. The precise impact of Basel III liquidity and leverage rules is yet to be determined, whereas the failed attempts to include repos in the European Financial Transactions Tax and the FSB’s watered-down repo proposals suggest that (countercyclical) collateral rules are only possible once states design alternative models of organizing their sovereign debt markets. Paradoxically, new initiatives in Europe suggest that a return to the repo trinity is rather more likely: the Capital Market Union plans to create Simple, Transparent and Standardized (STS) securitisation again illustrate the catalyst role that central banks choose to play in market-driven solutions to safe asset shortages […]