and gentlemen, the second characteristic is the importance of public - private partnerships. financial crimes are complex and multi - faceted. this responsibility does not rest solely on the authorities. it is only effective if we can integrate the resources, expertise and 2 / 4 bis - central bankers'speeches intelligence of law enforcement agencies, the financial intelligence unit ( fiu ), supervisors and the private sector. this is especially true for financial fraud and its associated ml risks. we have seen success stories in countries such as singapore, australia and hong kong, where public - private partnerships span across the areas of prevention, enforcement, recovery and awareness in combatting fraud. in malaysia, we have also embraced this approach. bank negara malaysia, together with the financial industry and the operator of our national payments network, collaborated to establish an integrated platform, the national fraud portal ( nfp ), to automate the tracing of stolen funds. to date, the portal has yielded positive results, including a notable 75 % reduction in the time required to trace stolen funds, a 28 % increase in average monthly earmarked amounts, and a 14 % improvement in mule account detection. beyond this, malaysia's collective efforts include industry - wide procedures for handling mule accounts as well as amendments to our legal framework, notably the penal code and criminal procedure code. these measures form part of our robust response framework to fight fraud. to further enhance consumer protection, we have also implemented the fair treatment policy to ensure more transparent and fair investigations by financial institutions for online fraud, emphasising the joint responsibilities of both customers and financial institutions in preventing unauthorised transactions. it is our joint responsibility to combat financial crimes. this is especially true with something as complex as cyber - enabled fraud. by fostering partnerships with all the relevant stakeholders from both the public and private sectors, i believe we can build a more resilient system and mount an effective defence against financial crimes. third : embracing growth to stay ahead of emerging threats ladies and gentlemen, the third characteristic i want to touch on is " growth ". relying solely on established processes can limit our ability and agility to combat financial crimes. we must continuously evolve to keep pace with the fast - changing landscape of financial crimes. to tip the scales in our favour, we must actively expand our capabilities and foster stronger collaboration across borders. leveraging the collective expertise of the global network is central to this effort. for instance, we can utilise established coordination structures like the asset recovery inter -

, and structural adjustments that will enhance competitiveness while at the same time be able to reduce the adverse impact these policies would have on the economy. however, it is important to recognise that drastic actions will have drastic consequences. while there is a general consensus that fiscal consolidation and structural adjustment are necessary to regain competitiveness and sustainable growth in the future, in the immediate term it will involve costs to the economy. as the experience in previous crises has shown, including during the asian financial crisis, there are threshold levels that when breached the economy will be pushed into an even deeper recession. this will in turn increase the cost of the resolution of the crisis and result in an even more prolonged period of weakness. the concern is also the potential huge financial and social costs. the asian experience during the financial crisis in the late 1990s has also shown that the potential for effective results is enhanced when the policy package is comprehensive. bis central bankers ’ speeches financial restructuring and repair, fiscal consolidation and structural adjustments have their best chance to yield results in an environment in which there is some economic growth. piecemeal policy measures that primarily focus on addressing the immediate problems will be inadequate and will not be able to garner sufficient growth momentum and thus sustain confidence. the financial restructuring and repair, the fiscal consolidation and structural adjustment urgently needs to be complemented with wide - ranging pro - growth policies. another challenge confronting the world economy lies in the manner in which policy coordination may be improved, both within and across borders, to maximise the impact of policy measures while minimising the unintended spillovers on other parts of the economy or financial system and across borders. enhanced coordination can also provide increased clarity on the direction of policy and reduce overreactions by the market while boosting confidence in prospects for the policies to achieve their intended outcomes. strong fundamentals in asia will continue to support our prospects in this more challenging environment. following the asian financial crisis, several emerging economies in asia have strengthened their economic and financial fundamentals, improved their fiscal and external debt positions, and reformed their banking sectors. this has yielded tremendous payoffs. it has supported our economies to withstand the effects during this recent global financial crisis. structural adjustments to diversify our economic structure and sources of growth have been an important part of this resilience. asia also continues to have considerable policy flexibility to respond to external and domestic developments, although a prolonged delay in the recovery in the advanced economies will erode this policy flexibility in the future. part 2 asia ’ s