an option, for brief periods of time, to counter adverse exchange - rate movements. intervention cannot stand alone, however. organisationally, this also implies that we must be able to adjust our interest rates when required, without being tied down by the meeting schedule of a monetary - policy committee. this is a well - known fact in the market and thus highly transparent. alternatively, one could say that our monetary - policy committee convenes every day and as required. central bank independence is a prerequisite in this respect. without it, the implementation of necessary measures can be endangered. we have a clear division of work regarding intra - marginal interventions. the board of governors, in collaboration with market operations, establishes a strategy based on current market conditions. the board of governors has access to real - time information on any interventions, but is not consulted in advance. interventions within one day are never capped, but subject to ongoing assessment in order to establish whether strategy adjustments are called for. the ecb is kept informed on an ongoing basis. in principle, one might ask whether the design of our stabilisation policy is appropriate? theoretically, there are two arguments for acting as we do. firstly, the institutions are designed to be in compliance with emu participation and thus also with the provisions of the treaty. at some future point in time we expect denmark to enter emu, and when it does, we will not have to alter our fiscal policy, since it is already based on government finances in surplus or close to balance. there is strong political support for this rule - bound division of labour in economic policy. the awarding of this year ’ s nobel prize in economic science demonstrates that the design of institutions is also considered to be of great theoretical importance. secondly, we know from the “ impossible trinity ” that in a world of free capital movements, it is not possible to set interest and exchange rates independently of one other. the central bank has one instrument, and one instrument only, at its disposal : the short - term rate. any attempts to stabilise the exchange rate while at the same time meeting other targets, are thus futile in theory. in practice, they spawn a number of problems which are aggravated the closer one seeks to stabilise the exchange rate. a number of central banks, including several from new eu member states, currently base their monetary policy on inflation targeting. in principle, the central bank seeks to approximately meet not only one, but two targets, an inflation target and an

not yet been fully adjusted. in addition, the future slope of the graph showing the number of banks in denmark could well depend on how the banks manage to tackle the challenges posed by today ’ s theme – increased digitalisation. * * * competition and cooperation in the new world of banking that awaits you and us will also affect the role of danmarks nationalbank. a case in point is the future participation by danmarks nationalbank in jointly owned infrastructure companies. i could also mention the issue of danmarks nationalbank ’ s oversight of the financial infrastructure – including in an area that is at the heart of today ’ s conference : competition from non - banks in the field of payments. bis central bankers ’ speeches in denmark, we have a long tradition of shared solutions for leveraging economies of scale and network effects. this is reflected in e. g. joint ownership of core companies within the financial sector, often with danmarks nationalbank as a co - owner. this means that the users – or customers – have also been owners, and the general operation of the company has been placed in the hands of a board of directors representing the owners – typically people like you and me. when these companies were set up, this was a natural way of doing things. it ensured that the various stakeholders had a say, which was a precondition for their full support. in addition, the companies were focused primarily on servicing their danish owners, which meant that business and competition issues were limited in scope. but over time this form of ownership has come under mounting pressure. the reasons differ from company to company, but frequent explanations include increased competition as a result of international regulation, technological advances, undesirable tying - up of capital and a need to achieve economies of scale. on balance, there can be no doubt that it has become more complex to operate such companies. this has increased the need for strong managerial skills, including the ability to secure the commercial interests of the company. an early example of a jointly owned company where it was necessary to change the ownership structure many years ago is the copenhagen stock exchange. some of you have been part of the process right back from stock exchange reform ii, when the cse was converted into a limited liability company, to the merger with omx and later with nasdaq. i will not go into detail, but simply conclude that no - one has questioned the need for a modern, efficient stock exchange, even at a time when the possible existence of a