to the new basel iii liquidity coverage ratio requirements, which require credit institutions to hold a minimum level of high - quality liquid assets so that they can cover an exceptional short - term liquidity requirement themselves. these new baskets therefore meet bis central bankers ’ speeches a significant market need. in this way, the snb is helping to ensure that the repo market remains liquid, also under the new liquidity requirements. reform efforts in the area of benchmark interest rates i would like to close by talking about progress that has been made in reforming benchmark interest rates. the international efforts to improve the credibility and acceptance of benchmark interest rates are being coordinated by the financial stability board, whose final report on this matter will be published this summer. as part of this work, a group of private sector financial market participants has drawn up alternatives to the libor. data are currently being collected so that the proposals can be evaluated. surveys are being carried out in all currency areas affected, including the swiss franc area, and the first results will also be available this summer. both the final report and the survey results are important steps towards reforming benchmark interest rates. however, the organisation that will administer the libor interest rates has already been established. it is ice benchmark administration limited ( iba ), a london - based subsidiary of the us exchange operator, intercontinental exchange ( ice ). along with the bank of england and the federal reserve, the snb is represented as an observer in the iba oversight committee. matters discussed by the oversight committee include methodology, definition and data basis for the libor rates ; as such it plays an important role in supporting and evaluating the reforms that have been adopted. bis central bankers ’ speeches charts bis central bankers ’ speeches bis central bankers ’ speeches

##atility measures for us equities ( vix ), us government bonds ( move ) and foreign exchange markets ( global fx ), all of which are derived from option prices. to ensure comparability, the individual data series have been normalised. they show how many standard deviations above or below their long - term average the figures are situated. in addition, the troughs since 2000 have been indicated at the right - hand edge of the chart. in january, volatility measures rose temporarily ; since then, however, they have returned to a declining path. at present, they are at least one standard deviation below average in all markets – and only marginally above the lowest level. apparently, expectations that the major central banks will continue their exceptionally accommodating monetary policy in the foreseeable future have firmed. the danger here is that risks will no longer be correctly priced, thereby making financial markets vulnerable to sudden mood swings on the part of investors. despite the fundamentally positive investor sentiment, demand for secure investments remains high. yields on sovereign bonds with high credit ratings have therefore declined significantly since the beginning of the year, particularly in the us, germany and switzerland, where ten - year yields are currently around 50 basis points lower than at the end of 2013. the bis central bankers ’ speeches decline in yields was especially marked in january, when uncertainty in a number of emerging economies and surprisingly weak economic data from the us spurred demand. in april and may, yields decreased further. this time, demand was attributable less to the publication of economic data and more to investors who, having speculated on rising yields, had covered their short positions when yields declined. the cautious attitude of many investors was also reflected in the continued high value of the swiss franc. chart 2 shows how the swiss franc has moved sideways against both the euro and the us dollar since the beginning of the year. in trade - weighted terms, the swiss franc is currently almost unchanged from january. structural changes in the foreign exchange and money markets as you will know, the swiss national bank ( snb ) implements its monetary policy via the money and foreign exchange markets. consequently, structural changes in these markets are particularly important to us. i would now like to talk briefly about the major changes and their significance for our work. on the foreign exchange market, we are seeing a substantial decline in turnover in the primary interbank market. meanwhile, the size of the market as a whole has decreased only