their support and active promotion of our shared goals. may i also recognize contributions of our stakeholders, the information security officers group - isog, the joint cyber security working group - jcswg, the joint anti - bank robbery action and cybercrime coordinating committee - jabraccc, and the national cybersecurity inter - agency committee - nciac, and all our other partners in the government and private sector in our fight against cybercrime. to conclude my speech, let me draw your attention to a powerful and symbolic acronym - sos, step - up capabilities, observe heightened vigilance, and stay connected. as you know, the acronym sos is the universally recognized distress signal. similarly, the fscrp serves as our collective call to action - signaling the urgent need to fortify our defenses and safeguard our financial system against the threats of the digital age. the 2024 to 2029 financial services cyber resilience plan is a pillar of the industry's cybersecurity strategy. i urge all of you to embrace this plan as a commitment to building reliability, security, and trust in financial services for every filipino. maraming salamat at mabuhay tayong lahat! 3 / 3 bis - central bankers'speeches

previously the huge losses from the forward book led to a structural liquidity surplus in the money markets, which had to be mopped up by using expensive instruments such as the so called special money markets swaps, our operations in the money markets now follow what one may refer to as normal central banking patterns. moreover, all these achievements also enabled the bank to focus more on increasing the official reserves to more internationally acceptable levels. what that level is, is rather difficult to say, and there appears to be no universally agreed upon international benchmark in this regard. the appropriate level may need to be evaluated against a country's specific circumstances such as the size of its economy and degree of openness, its exchange rate regime, credit rating, risk of capital flight, and many other factors. extensive research on the subject continues to be undertaken here and internationally. as stated previously, whilst not working toward a specific target for reserves within a specific time frame, the bank is strengthening its reserves mainly by means of purchasing, in a reponsible manner, moderate amounts of foreign exchange in the market, as and when, in our opinion, market conditions permit such purchases without unduly influencing the exchange rate and introducing unnecessary volatility in the market. we continue to accept that the exchange rate is set in the market. from time to time the bank was also supported by the national treasury in the process of accumulating reserves, when the proceeds of foreign bond issuances were sold to the bank in exchange for rand. in addition to " creaming - off " and foreign borrowing by government, the bank also borrows foreign currency in its own name mainly through the syndicated loan market, which increases the level of gross reserves. the international liquidity position has increased to $ 8, 6 billion as at 31 august 2004 and the gross reserves ( including gold reserves of approximately 4 million fine ounces ) increased to slightly more than $ 12 billion at the end of last month. this is indeed a remarkable achievement, when one considers that at the time of our meeting in 2001, the negative nofp stood at us $ 9bn, as indicated earlier. some observers at times blame the bank for not increasing the pace at which it is accumulating foreign exchange reserves. these well'educated and informed'folks sometimes forget that converting a negative nofp position of $ 23, 2 billion in september 1998 into a positive net reserve position of $ 8, 6 billion in august 2004, implies that over this six - year