ardian fullani : bank - business relationships - a new chapter speech by mr ardian fullani, governor of the bank of albania, at the meeting organised by the bank of albania in cooperation with the business community of the country, tirana, 13 december 2004. * * * honored participants! i regard today ’ s meeting as a special opportunity to both communities, the banking one and the business one, to open a new communication and cooperation, a new relationship based on reciprocal trust and benefit. from a naive viewpoint, it seems that our final goal, price stability and country ’ s financial stability would appear different from your goal, the maximization of profit from the activity you exercise. however, going into more details, we would notice that both communities represented in this hall with their decisions and achievements make the work of each other easier, towards the indisputable idea that no economic growth could exist without economic - financial stability. it is easier for you to make important decisions for growing your business in a stabilized economic environment where inflation rate is low. otherwise, you would feel insecure, especially concerning the perspective of your business. also, in the case of the country ’ s financial stability and presence of a consolidated banking sector, you would feel more convenient and naturally the flow of free financial funds would be addressed to qualitative growth of your businesses. on the other hand, a fragile financial system, with insecure unsupervised segments would increase the potential for powerful shocks, which in one way or another would affect not only the business but also the overall savings. below i will treat some complicated theoretical issues. simultaneously, i would not like to offer an apology or to make propagandistic declarations. along with the purpose i have to introduce some recent initiatives of the bank of albania in the viewpoint of its new vision, i will briefly treat the awareness of your community to enhance the cooperation with the banking system, including the bank of albania, the institution i govern. i hope you have recently had the chance to hear and debate about cash reduction in economy, about the acute need the banking system has for the creation of some important information registers, as i also hope you share the same opinion with me that the banking system has made obvious progress recently. i take advantage of the opportunity to declare right from the beginning that it has not to do with propagandistic campaigns but with concrete projects, which will make the banking business more useful, naturally not only for you but for the

. je forme le voeu que ce centre d ’ excellence dans le domaine de la monnaie et des relations internationales continue a fournir a notre pays les services qu ’ il nous a rendus jusqu ’ ici. je ferme cette parenthese pour en venir a cette question qui nous preoccupe tous : qu ’ en est - il de la conjoncture? sommes - nous au terme de la phase de stagnation qui frappe si durement la suisse depuis 1990? pourquoi cette traversee du desert si douloureuse sur le plan social? quels sont nos moyens pour gerer la situation? j ’ aborderai le probleme en trois phases : en premier lieu, je ferai le point sur la conjoncture internationale et mettrai en evidence la situation particuliere dans laquelle se trouve l ’ europe continentale dont notre pays depend si etroitement. ensuite, je ferai une retrospective des evenements conjoncturels des annees nonante et m ’ attarderai sur les problemes specifiques rencontres par notre pays. enfin, je tirerai de ce survol quelques enseignements pour la conduite de la politique economique dans ce pays. 1. un survol conjoncturel commencons par faire le point de la situation conjoncturelle. comment ne pas etre frappe par la cesure qui existe, aujourd ’ hui, dans les pays de l ’ ocde entre le monde anglo - saxon, d ’ une part, et l ’ europe continentale, de l ’ autre. les etats - unis font preuve d ’ une bonne sante conjoncturelle, qui semble resister a l ’ usure du temps. apres avoir stagne, puis recule a la fin des annees quatre - vingt, l ’ economie americaine a retrouve le chemin de la croissance. l ’ emploi global n ’ a pas cesse d ’ augmenter et le taux de chomage de baisser. la croissance de l ’ economie se poursuit sans