philip r lane : welcome address - “ challenges in the digital age ” welcome remarks by mr philip r lane, member of the executive board of the european central bank, at the ecb conference on " challenges in the digital age ", frankfurt am main, 4 july 2019. * * * it is a pleasure to welcome all of you to the ecb for this conference. 1 as a central bank, understanding the myriad implications of digitalisation for the economy is a high priority : the presentations at this conference will provide us with the latest thinking and new insights, helping us in our economic assessments. of course, digitalisation is also reshaping financial systems and payment systems, while at the same time stimulating intense interest in concepts such as crypto - assets and central bank digital currencies. however, the focus of this event is on the real economy, so i will not dwell on these other topics today. let me mention just a few economic implications of digitalisation that require careful assessment by central banks. first, substantial investment is required to reap the benefits of digitalisation. a distinctive feature of digital technologies is their reliance on intangible capital. for instance, according to national accounts data, the share of investment devoted to intellectual property has almost doubled over the past two decades. this measure, however, is bound to underestimate the actual importance of intangible capital, since many of its components are not included in the national accounts. 2 there is some evidence that the weakness of physical capital investment over the past few years, if not longer, can to a large extent be explained by intangibles. 3 at the same time, the difficulty of measuring investment in intangibles points to a more general challenge in quantifying digitalisation and its implications. furthermore, the global mobility of intangible assets means that it is also difficult to attribute the production and use of such assets to particular jurisdictions. 4 the balance of evidence suggests that europe is somewhat lagging behind its counterparts in the development of the digital sector. for example, according to oecd estimates, the share of the information and communications technology ( ict ) sector in value added is less than 5 % for most euro area countries, which compares with around 7 % for the united states and 8 % for japan. 5 similarly, when it comes to research and development ( r & d ) spending, the eu is now trailing both china and the united states, especially in the business sector. financing is one

jose manuel gonzalez - paramo : the response of the eurosystem to the financial crisis keynote speech by mr jose manuel gonzalez - paramo, member of the executive board of the european central bank, at the european parliament ’ s special committee on the financial, economic and social crisis ( cris ), brussels, 10 november 2009. * * * introduction i am happy to have the opportunity to speak in front of the european parliament ’ s special committee on the financial, economic and social crisis on the eurosystem ’ s various measures to address the crisis. the financial crisis created great uncertainty and presented a number of challenges from the policy - making perspective. it is generally recognised that from the start of the tensions, the eurosystem ’ s response to the crisis has been effective. indeed, when widespread tensions severely impaired the functioning of the money market in early august 2007, the eurosystem rapidly reacted by injecting €95 billion into the banking sector in an overnight operation, followed by various additional liquidity injecting operations. when the crisis intensified again in september 2008, the eurosystem swiftly reacted by announcing further exceptional measures to enhance the provision of liquidity to banks. similarly, the rapid and pronounced cuts in interest rates after october 2008 represented a timely response to contain the spreading of the turmoil from the financial sector to the real economy, with significant risks to the outlook for price stability. in my speech today, i will first review the main steps taken by the eurosystem in response to the crisis. next i will elaborate on the effects that these non - standard measures had on the eurosystem ’ s balance sheet and on the provision of liquidity to the financial sector. finally, i will report on our current thinking about the phasing out of some of these measures. the eurosystem ’ s monetary policy response central banks around the world reacted to the financial crisis by both cutting policy interest rates and engaging in so - called “ non - standard ” measures of monetary policy. these are called “ non - standard ” because they go beyond changes in the interest rate, which represents the traditional tool with which central banks steer monetary conditions in the economy. between october 2008 and may 2009, the eurosystem ’ s key policy rate – the interest rate on the main refinancing operations – was lowered by a cumulative 325 basis points. the speed and extent of the monetary loosening experienced over this period are without precedent since the eurosystem took responsibility for the