colleagues, do every day. so i just want to draw your attention to three aspects of that work that speak to the man. the first is glenn ’ s dedication to the task. it has not been unusual for him to spend a full day at 65 martin place, have an official dinner in the evening and then go home and join an international conference call starting at 11pm to discuss some arcane regulatory issue. and then after getting to bed in the small hours of the morning he is back in the office early to lead our regular morning discussions of overnight developments in global markets. he has put in a herculean effort. the second is glenn ’ s relentless commitment to work of the highest standard. at the reserve bank we pride ourselves on producing work of the highest quality : whether in our written work or in the way we operate key parts of the national financial infrastructure. glenn – in his unassuming style – has led the way here. through his example, he has encouraged us to be the best we can be, and to be worthy of the trust that the public has put in our institution. the third is glenn ’ s open and consultative style. as you can imagine, in an institution with lots of economists there are lots of opinions too! glenn has managed this with great aplomb. he is always ready to listen and to seek out alternative perspectives. he has chaired both the reserve bank board and the payments system board in the same way. we have all benefited from his inclusive and consultative manner. in short, what you see externally is what my colleagues and i see internally as well. he is going to be a darn hard act to follow! before i finish, i also want to acknowledge the contribution of glenn ’ s wife, sue stevens, who is also here this evening. i know sue has been a fantastic support to glenn. sue has had to endure her husband working very hard and constantly being in the public spotlight. sue, you have done this with great dignity and quiet grace and you should be immensely proud of what you and your husband have accomplished. thank you. finally, could i ask you to be upstanding for a toast. glenn, on behalf of all of us here tonight, and more importantly, on behalf of the 24 million australians whom you have served so well, thank you. glenn stevens. bis central bankers ’ speeches

it was also evident in other measures, including bid - offer spreads, mispricing along the yield curve, and the ability to trade in futures without moving the price. these all improved, to be close to pre - crisis levels. the general improvement in financial sentiment – aided by the range of other policies, both monetary and fiscal – is also likely to have played a role. in any case, since late april we have scaled back purchases significantly and have not needed to purchase any bonds for some time. we stand ready though to buy bonds if bond market conditions deteriorate significantly, or indeed, if needed to achieve the target of around 25 basis points for the 3 - year ags yield. term funding another initiative from the bank was the term funding facility to lower borrowing costs and support lending, particularly to businesses. the tff does this by providing a guaranteed source of funding to adis for 3 years at the low cost of 25 basis points, with an incentive to increase lending to businesses, especially small and medium - sized enterprises ( smes ). funds provided under the tff are secured against collateral, as is the case with the bank's other facilities. the tff provided banks with the option of an initial allowance of around $ 90 billion. this has since grown to around $ 150 billion, with additional allowances granted to individual banks that have increased their lending to businesses since the facility began in april. take - up of the tff is currently around $ 26 billion, or around 17 per cent of the total currently on offer ( graph 7 ). there are a few reasons why banks have not taken up more of this funding at this stage in the program. one is simply that many banks have accessed even cheaper funding from other sources in recent months, albeit at shorter tenors than three years. in particular, banks have been able to issue bank bills at rates below 25 basis points. similarly, bank deposits have grown, and an increasing share of deposits have been paying rates below 25 basis points. also, the tff provides funding for three years from the date of the drawdown, so the longer an adi waits to draw funds, the later they will have to repay the money. with no pressing funding need right now, and ample alternative short - term funding at low cost, delaying the drawdown is a useful option. https : / / www. rba. gov. au / speeches / 2020 / sp - ag - 2020 - 07 - 27. html 8 /