years was an early symptom of the growing risks faced by the global economy. these risks have now materialised. their home - grown causes, such as insufficient savings and rising indebtedness in some advanced economies, excessive risk - taking and poor risk management, an overly inflated financial sphere, and the emergence of asset and real estate price bubbles, now appear obvious. but they were more difficult to spot ex ante. by contrast, the home - grown i wish to thank a. mehl and m. fratzscher for their contribution to preparing this speech. the opinions reflect those of the author. “ anomalies ” and imbalances were more clearly reflected in large external imbalances at global level. these were more widely recognised and acknowledged. in fact, many of the macro roots of the current crisis were behind the widening of global imbalances in the last decade. let me just mention three issues : • first, the marked asymmetry characterising the global financial system. on the one hand, rapid financial innovation and the sophistication of financial products in some mature economies have spurred consumer indebtedness through easy internal and external financing. on the other hand, pervasive financial under - development in some emerging economies has encouraged the recycling of hefty savings and current account surpluses into the financing of ever - growing mature economy deficits. • second, there are profound asymmetries in the international monetary system. on the one hand, floating exchange rates have prevailed among mature economy currencies since the collapse of the bretton woods system in 1971, a collapse which was also due to major imbalances in the global economy. on the other hand, exchange rates have remained heavily managed in emerging economies, notably vis - a - vis the us dollar. this is why some academics referred to the current international monetary system as “ bretton woods ii ”. 2 under this system, the us has run large current account deficits, which are the source of export - led growth for other countries, and they in turn have bought up dollars and dollar - denominated assets to fund the us deficit and growing external indebtedness. in particular, there have been significant purchases by these countries of paper issued by us government - sponsored enterprises, which play a key role in us housing markets. • a third related factor is insufficient macroeconomic discipline. in some economies, macroeconomic policies have not always been sufficiently focused on medium - term

jean - claude trichet : ecb press conference – introductory statement introductory statement by mr jean - claude trichet, president of the european central bank, and mr vitor constancio, vice - president of the european central bank, frankfurt am main, 9 june 2011. * * * ladies and gentlemen, the vice - president and i are very pleased to welcome you to our press conference. we will now report on the outcome of today ’ s meeting, which was also attended by commissioner rehn. based on its regular economic and monetary analyses, the governing council decided to keep the key ecb interest rates unchanged. the information that has become available since our meeting on 5 may 2011 confirms continued upward pressure on overall inflation, mainly owing to energy and commodity prices. the underlying pace of monetary expansion is gradually recovering. monetary liquidity remains ample, with the potential to accommodate price pressures in the euro area. furthermore, the most recent data confirm the positive underlying momentum of economic activity in the euro area, while uncertainty remains elevated. overall, our monetary policy stance remains accommodative, lending support to economic activity. on balance, risks to the outlook for price stability are on the upside. accordingly, strong vigilance is warranted. on the basis of our assessment, we will act in a firm and timely manner. we will do all that is needed to prevent recent price developments giving rise to broad - based inflationary pressures. we remain strongly determined to secure a firm anchoring of inflation expectations in the euro area in line with our aim of maintaining inflation rates below, but close to, 2 % over the medium term. this is a prerequisite for monetary policy to make an ongoing contribution towards supporting growth and job creation in the euro area. the governing council today also decided to continue conducting its main refinancing operations ( mros ) as fixed rate tender procedures with full allotment for as long as necessary, and at least until the end of the ninth maintenance period of 2011 on 11 october 2011. this procedure will also remain in use for the eurosystem ’ s special - term refinancing operations with a maturity of one maintenance period, which will continue to be conducted for as long as needed, and at least until the end of the third quarter of 2011. the fixed rate in these special - term refinancing operations will be the same as the mro rate prevailing at the time. furthermore, the governing council decided to conduct the three - month