BERLIN - THE German cabinet finalised on Monday the conditions under which banks can make use of a 480-billion-euro (S$960 billion) rescue package rushed through parliament last week.

If banks hit by the financial crisis apply for support their executives may earn no more than 500,000 euros (S$993,817), and each lender is restricted to receiving 10 billion euros (S$19.9 billion) in capital, a finance ministry spokesman said.

Any dividend payments must go to the state's and the government can also force banks to reduce or give up entirely particularly risky lending practices, as well as to continue making loans to small and medium sized firms.

The government can also buy up toxic assets from banks but this is limited to five billion euros worth per lender.

The programme passed by lawmakers on Friday includes 400 billion euros in loan guarantees in order to get banks lending to each other and up to 80 billion euros to shore up banks' balance sheets battered by the financial crisis.

So far, no bank has signalled its intention to apply for aid under the rescue package but press reports said that the regional Bayerische Landesbank (BayernLB), the Bavarian state-owned lender, could be among the first.

The regional bank could require 'billions of euros' in liquidity, state guarantees, and state purchases of high-risk instruments, the Bild daily cited Bavaria's finance minister Erwin Huber as saying on Monday.

The rescue package, the biggest in postwar Germany, was similar to other measures announced by Germany's partners in the 15-country eurozone along the lines of a British programme after crisis talks in Paris on October 12. -- AFP