of existence, it is now fully operational, with more than 2, 300 supervisory decisions in 2017 alone. those of you who work within the ssm are the living breathing reality of european integration. every day you prove that closer cooperation, closer union is not a dream of the past but something we are still capable of today. part of the ssm ’ s success stems from its design : the mechanism constitutes an original model of federalism, based on a close and continuous collaboration between the ecb and national authorities at all levels : from the composition of the supervisory board to the joint supervisory teams ( jsts ), the on - site teams and staff secondments. this does not mean that all is rosy and that culture and practices have fully converged within the ssm. success allows us to consider now how the day - to - day functioning of the ssm can still be improved. in my view, there are three main strategic priorities : the first one is to further simplify processes. i welcome the current initiatives, including the creation of the simplification group chaired by petra senkovic from the ecb and edouard fernandez - bollo from the acpr. various measures are under development, like the growing use of delegation, the streamlining of srep or jst functioning. however, an essential challenge will be to make sure that all processes will remain optimised over time and that simplification becomes a full and permanent part of decision - making, from conception to execution. to do so, simplification has to become one of the values that guide the ssm. the second priority is to promote mobility, thanks in particular to staff secondments and more on - site supervisors working on banks outside their home country. other initiatives could include very short staff exchanges or swaps within jsts, between the ecb and national authorities, to allow members to better understand the culture and practices of their 2 / 3 bis central bankers'speeches counterparts. the third and final priority is to develop synergies. just as with the eurosystem, the banking union constitutes a system with a strong center and strong national components, which ultimately have to act as one team. the goal is to make the best use of national resources by fostering their participation in all key tasks of the ssm. national authorities should not hesitate to step up their involvement in the ssm. in return, the ecb should further empower national authorities, especially in the framework of day - to - day

has a distinctive position among central banks with regard to openness. in this respect the bank of england has shown the way for the riksbank. i dare say that the swedish general public know more about the riksbank ’ s monetary policy now than when it was controlled by elected politicians. and this is how it has to be. as i said before, openness is a prerequisite for independence. sometimes, i come across fantastic ideas about the bank ’ s independence, but when i explain the situation, i often meet understanding for the riksbank ’ s new position. what i have talked about primarily concerns how we handle the duty to maintain price stability. the changes that took place at the beginning of 1999 were, as i said earlier, occasioned by the demands made by the maastricht treaty on the monetary policy decision - making process, which made necessary a new riksbank act. the riksbank ’ s conduct of monetary policy is also what usually gives rise to discussion. as long as the payment systems function, financial stability is not threatened and access to cash means of payment is good, there is no reason on the part of the general public and the media to focus attention on this issue. the riksbank will only be called to account if problems arise, although the bank devotes considerable resources to these areas under normal conditions too. the riksbank is responsible for the supply of cash for about a year now, an independent subsidiary, psab, pengar i sverige ab, has been responsible for the operational cash management in sweden. the riksbank still has overall responsibility for cash supply, of course, but we now exercise this largely by carrying out supervision of psab. financial stability leads to a secure payment system an important component of the riksbank ’ s task of promoting a secure and efficient payment system is to monitor and evaluate developments in the bank system. since the banks have a key role in provision of banknotes and payment services to the general public, it is important that their activities function well. a prerequisite for this is that financial stability is not threatened. unlike many other countries, the swedish central bank does not have the role of supervisory authority. here instead there is a special authority, finansinspektionen ( the financial supervisory authority ), that bears the responsibility of supervising the individual institutions while the riksbank focuses its supervision on detecting systemic risks. the riksbank has decided to act with