Alongside other UK authorities and international bodies, the Bank is proud to provide the infrastructure on which private sector innovation can flourish – whether that is ‘hard infrastructure’, when the Bank, or public sector, provides core parts of the system directly, as with our Real-Time Gross Settlements (RTGS) service; or ‘soft infrastructure’, meaning the regulation, laws, rules, and standards set by the public sector on which private companies rely. The Bank stands ready to provide the right type of infrastructure depending on the situation. Sometimes the Bank will need to be in the lead, sometimes it will work as part of a coalition of public organisations. 1  https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/-/media/boe/files/speech/2019/embracing-fintech-speech-by-dave-ramsden.pdf https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/-/media/boe/files/report/2019/response-to-the-future-of-financereport.pdf?la=en&hash=34D2FA7879CBF3A1296A0BE8DCFA5976E6E26CF0 3 https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/speech/2020/dave-ramsden-speech-public-lecture-for-university-of-nottingham 4 https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-kalifa-review-of-uk-fintech 2  2  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/speeches and @BoE_PressOffice  2  Sometimes we’ll work in collaboration with the private sector, and sometimes our role will be to act more as a ‘critical friend’. And sometimes, as with RTGS, that will mean timely upgrades to critical technology, while at other times it can mean working right at the cutting edge, as with our work on central bank digital currencies and artificial intelligence (AI). In the rest of this speech, I’ll describe how the Bank of England goes about pursuing its mission in the fintech sector, and give some examples of how we put those principles into practice, developing the right public infrastructure both for incumbents and firms looking to scale up. Payments One topic I don’t intend to cover in detail today is our work on payments.

Mohd Razif bin Abd Kadir: Brief overview of Islamic banking and finance Speech by Mr Mohd Razif bin Abd Kadir, Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Malaysia, at the Official Launch of Kuala Lumpur International Islamic Finance Expo 2006, Kuala Lumpur, 24 November 2006. *  *  *  It is indeed an honour to be here this morning at the launching of the Kuala Lumpur International Islamic Finance Expo 2006, organized by the Association of Islamic Banking Institutions Malaysia (AIBIM). It was exactly five years ago that all of us witnessed the launching of the first Islamic Banking and Takaful Week by the then Deputy Prime Minister, Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi. And now, after those years, Alhamdulillah, we are pleased with the positive impact of the comprehensive awareness campaign in the year 2001 as it has paved the way to subsequent nationwide annual campaigns on financial awareness in Islamic banking and finance. In this regard, I wish to congratulate all financial institutions involved for providing their unwavering support in this virtuous endeavour. Before I proceed, allow me to take this opportunity to welcome our exhibitors, both local and foreign, who will be participating in the Kuala Lumpur International Islamic Finance Expo 2006. We believe that your participation will benefit the patrons to this expo.