digital transformation of the retail payments ecosystem welcome address by ignazio visco governor of the bank of italy at the ecb and banca d ’ italia joint conference, rome 30 november 2017 i am pleased to welcome all the speakers and participants to this conference on the ongoing digital transformations in the retail payments ecosystem. the programme is remarkable : many key issues for central banks and the private sector will be discussed in these two days. let me take this opportunity to thank the organizers at both the bank of italy and the european central bank for putting together such a broad and relevant array of topics. the fast evolution of digital technologies promises to deliver benefits but it also creates new challenges for the payment system and its stakeholders. today ’ s conference is an opportunity to take stock of recent advances, to evaluate possible future landscapes in retail payments and to discuss the challenges and opportunities they pose to central banks and the population at large. i am sure that maintaining a continuous dialogue among central bankers, private sector representatives and academics on the subjects that will be discussed in this conference will contribute to the efficiency and safety of our payment systems. the diffusion of digital technologies is having pervasive effects on our society. today, around eighty per cent of the european population has a smartphone, personal computer or tablet to navigate the internet. we use the internet to perform many fundamental activities that influence our behaviour and productivity, such as communicating and searching for information. the rise of e - commerce is also having substantial, and at times disruptive, effects in many industries. digital innovations, such as big data and artificial intelligence, are used for medical diagnoses, in the transportation sector and to select the news that is reported on social media. the explosive growth of electronic devices controlled through the internet suggests that the “ internet - of - things ” will play an important role in our daily lives. as the youngest, tech - savvy generations approach adulthood, the effects of these phenomena are bound to become even more significant than they are today. the digital transformation of our society has also changed the type of payment instruments we use. indeed, the more we use digital distribution channels in our consumer expenditures, the more we need digital forms of money to pay for these transactions. but there is also a cultural change behind this process. credit and debit cards are increasingly used in brick - and - mortar stores, and in some countries banknotes are no longer the most common means of payment. the highly dynamic landscape of payment systems is ever evolving. while new

guy quaden : price and wage rigidities in an open economy opening address by mr guy quaden, governor of the national bank of belgium, at the fourth biennial colloquium of the national bank of belgium, brussels, 12 october 2006. * * * it is a great pleasure for me to open the fourth biennial colloquium of the national bank of belgium and to welcome you all at this conference. the topic of this year's conference is " price and wage rigidities in an open economy ". understanding how prices and wages are determined and how they fluctuate over the business cycle is of course a crucial issue for central banks. nominal and real rigidities in price and wage setting have a strong impact on how the economy, and inflation in particular, reacts to all kinds of shocks. as far as these rigidities result in deviations of prices from their efficient levels, they will lead to an inefficient allocation of resources and unnecessary volatility in output and employment. especially in a global context, with a rapidly changing external environment, flexible prices and wages can protect the economy against costly real adjustments and improve its resilience. that is the very reason why we are interested in measuring these rigidities, in understanding their nature and in assessing their welfare implications. this knowledge may eventually result in formulating deliberate policy recommendations for structural reforms in view of reducing rigidities in price and wage setting, to the extent that this is desirable from a welfare perspective. however, as far as these rigidities are deeply rooted, monetary policymakers are faced with them as part of the environment in which they operate. price and wage rigidities have indeed a strong impact on the monetary transmission mechanism. they also affect the way central banks will combine their pursuit of price stability with a more general concern about real economic developments and the policy trade - offs involved. the importance of these issues induced the national bank of belgium to devote its 4th biennial colloquium to " price and wage rigidities in an open economy ". the aim of this conference is to promote theoretical and empirical research, both at the micro and the macro level, on the measurement, the rationale and the consequences of price and wage rigidities in an open economy. by way of an introduction to the conference, i would like to underline the policy relevance of many of the topics that will be discussed in the presentations today and tomorrow. in order to evaluate the relevance of the different types of rigidities, it