IMF head Christine Lagarde said Thursday that the crisis lender would get a significant boost to its intervention capacity this week as worries mounted that Spain might be the next eurozone country to seek a rescue.

Warning that “dark clouds” still hover over the global economy, she expressed confidence that International Monetary Fund members meeting in Washington would put up the funds needed for a “global firewall.”

But with the United States not taking part, all eyes were on China and the other BRICS emerging powers to see if they would contribute some of their newfound wealth, knowing that some of it could go to more bailouts in Europe.

“As part of the outcome of this meeting, we expect our firepower to be significantly increased,” she said, hours after Poland and Switzerland declared their contributions to the $400 billion pool targeted to protect countries from any financial contagion from Europe.

“You’ve got lots of clouds out there,” she told journalists ahead of the annual IMF-World Bank spring meeting, calling the eurozone “the epicenter of potential risks.”

Worries that Spain might be the next country to seek a bailout, sparking new turmoil across the fragile eurozone, have filled markets over the past week.

On Thursday Madrid scraped through a key bond market test but failed to quash doubts over its future finances ― the cost of its borrowing was pushed toward the 6 percent level seen as unsustainable.

“Spain has replaced Greece in the international and especially the Anglo-Saxon press as the country that has the most problems. The problems are clearly enormous but reforms are being made,” said Daniel Pingarron, analyst at Spanish brokerage IG Markets. (AFP)