report, which covers financial and banking markets, already focuses on important dimensions of the financial system, the coverage of the indicators will be further developed ; in particular, it is envisaged to add indicators of the underlying factors of integration related to financial institutions and market infrastructures. the ecb report provides, on the basis of 20 quantitative indicators, an overall assessment of the degree of financial integration in the main financial market segments. it is shown that the degree of integration differs from market segment to market segment, with integration being more advanced in those market segments that are closer to the single monetary policy. today, i will indeed concentrate on the most integrated market, namely the money market, and i would like to refer you to the report for our assessment of the other financial markets. as regards the money market, the various indicators presented in the ecb report measure financial integration based on the dispersion of lending rates – namely overnight rates, unsecured lending rates and repo rates – offered by banks in euro area countries, with the data referring to actual transactions or rates offered by eonia, euribor and eurepo panel banks. also the different segments of the money market show different degrees of integration. the unsecured interbank market has, since shortly after the introduction of the euro, been integrated to a nearly perfect extent. in fact, our indicators display a euro area cross - country standard deviation for the overnight maturity of around 3 basis points shortly after the start of 1999 and only around one basis point by today. as a comparison to these impressive figures, just recall that one year before the start of monetary union, in january 1998, the cross - country standard deviation of the average overnight lending rates among euro area countries still stood at more than 130 basis points. as a first example of the eurosystem ’ s contributions to fostering financial integration by acting as a catalyst for private - sector activities, i would like to mention the ecb ’ s calculation and publication of the eonia rate. the technical definition and the procedures for the calculation of the eonia rate were defined by market participants through a series of market conventions. the eonia rate is a concrete see http : / / www. ecb. int / pub / pdf / other / indicatorsfinancialintegration200509en. pdf 3 / 6 example how market participants play an important role in fostering financial integration through the adoption of market conventions, facilitated by the ecb acting as a catalyst.

federation ) and euribor aci, of the eonia swap index in june this year is evidence of both the importance and the further potential of this market segment. i now turn to the least integrated money market segment, namely the one for short - term securities. compared with the equivalent us commercial paper market, which has an outstanding amount of around eur 1. 3 trillion, the aggregate size of the commercial paper and certificates of deposit markets in europe is around eur 0. 8 trillion. 11 in addition, while the us market is integrated, the short - term securities markets in europe continue to be segmented, with de facto several markets based in several market places. issuers and investors in the european short - term paper markets are therefore confronted with reduced depth and liquidity, and they have less diversification opportunities than in the us. the short - term european paper ( step ) initiative, which was set up and is being led by aci – the financial markets association, aims to overcome such fragmentation and to promote the development of a pan - european short - term paper market. step specifically aims to promote the convergence of the standards and practices prevailing in the european short - term securities markets through market players ’ voluntary compliance with the standards set out in the step market convention, which covers aspects like information disclosure, documentation, settlement, and the provision of data for the production of step statistics. since may this year, the european banking federation has been very fruitfully supporting the aci in the completion of the preparatory work. moreover, the european banking federation will directly contribute to the functioning of the step market, once in operation. see bis triennial central bank survey - foreign exchange and derivatives market activity in 2004 ( march 2005 ). see bis triennial central bank survey - foreign exchange and derivatives market activity in 2004 ( march 2005 ). including instruments issued on european markets, but denominated in currencies other than the euro. 4 / 6 the promoters are at present finalising the step convention and expect to see the first step - labelled programme in early 2006. as with the example of the ecb calculating and publishing the eonia rate, which i mentioned earlier, the ecb has supported the step initiative since its inception by acting as a catalyst for private - sector activities. back in 2001, the first discussions on step took place at the meetings of the ecb money market contact group. in 2002, the ecb hosted on its website the aci ’ s public consultation on