Refinancing rate
The historic rate at which a central bank lent to banks; its market role has passed to the modern policy rate, while the old rate survives inside legal texts.
How to read the number
It turns up in contracts, tax calculations and court practice as the base for penalties and interest, not as a signal to markets.
When the metric lies
Where it has been equated with the policy rate it nonetheless remains a separate legal concept, and older documents refer to it specifically.
Also known as: refi rate