christine lagarde : ecb press conference - introductory statement introductory statement by ms christine lagarde, president of the european central bank, and mr luis de guindos, vice - president of the european central bank, frankfurt am main, 11 april 2024. * * * good afternoon, the vice - president and i welcome you to our press conference. the governing council today decided to keep the three key ecb interest rates unchanged. the incoming information has broadly confirmed our previous assessment of the medium - term inflation outlook. inflation has continued to fall, led by lower food and goods price inflation. most measures of underlying inflation are easing, wage growth is gradually moderating, and firms are absorbing part of the rise in labour costs in their profits. financing conditions remain restrictive and our past interest rate increases continue to weigh on demand, which is helping to push down inflation. but domestic price pressures are strong and are keeping services price inflation high. we are determined to ensure that inflation returns to our two per cent medium - term target in a timely manner. we consider that the key ecb interest rates are at levels that are making a substantial contribution to the ongoing disinflation process. our future decisions will ensure that our policy rates will stay sufficiently restrictive for as long as necessary. if our updated assessment of the inflation outlook, the dynamics of underlying inflation and the strength of monetary policy transmission were to further increase our confidence that inflation is converging to our target in a sustained manner, it would be appropriate to reduce the current level of monetary policy restriction. in any event, we will continue to follow a data - dependent and meeting - by - meeting approach to determining the appropriate level and duration of restriction, and we are not precommitting to a particular rate path. the decisions taken today are set out in a press release available on our website. i will now outline in more detail how we see the economy and inflation developing and will then explain our assessment of financial and monetary conditions. economic activity the economy remained weak in the first quarter. while spending on services is resilient, manufacturing firms are facing weak demand and production is still subdued, especially in energy - intensive sectors. surveys point to a gradual recovery over the course of this year, led by services. this recovery is expected to be supported by rising real incomes, resulting from lower inflation, increased wages and improved terms of trade. in addition, the growth of euro area exports should pick up over the coming quarters, as the global

carl - ludwig thiele : citius, altius, fortius – challenges for payments and settlement systems and their analysis speech by mr carl - ludwig thiele, member of the executive board of the deutsche bundesbank, at the conference " economics of payments viii " 2016, eltville am rhein, 9 november 2016. * * * dear participants of the economics of payments conference, dear president weidmann, thank you for your welcoming introduction to this conference. on behalf of the executive board of the bundesbank and of the directorate general payments and settlement systems i too would like to extend a warm welcome to everybody attending this event at our training and conference centre in eltville. the latin phrase “ citius, altius, fortius ", which translates as “ faster, higher, stronger ", has been the motto of the olympic games since 1949. the french dominican preacher henri didon originally coined the term back in 1891 for a youth sports competition, the aim being to motivate his students to give their level best and survive the stress of competing. this rallying call strikes me as equally prescient today with regard to payments. market participants ’ expectations of the availability, speed and security of payment systems are growing at an ever increasing rate. users are demanding that payment be made almost immediately, wherever the recipient is in the world and round the clock, all without any hiccups during transmission. ideally, payees would like to know exactly when they will take receipt of payment so as to be able to use that expected liquidity again in real time. if we are to fulfil these expectations then it will be necessary to massively expand the requirements that apply regarding the operation, oversight and analysis of payment and settlement systems. the operators of payment and settlement platforms, be they public or private in nature, are now consequently faced with growing challenges. the payments landscape is currently undergoing a number of significant developments that may prove game - changing. these include the advent of instant payments and the establishment of innovative fintech solutions as well as distributed ledger technology, which is built upon blockchain algorithms. the eurosystem is currently examining and enhancing its market infrastructure services by pursuing a range of project initiatives. on the one hand, following the successful migration of target2 securities, it is anticipated that the benefits and modern technology offered by this new platform can be put to use for target2 as well. moreover, in a second project, the eurosystem