##st place for your savings is in the financial institution that it is presently in ; • don ’ t fear that the country will run out of cash. we have printed enough notes to provide for any conceivable demand ; and • remember you are only really dealing with a long weekend. banks, building societies and credit unions will be open on the three days before new year ’ s day, which is the saturday, and will re - open on the tuesday. new year ’ s eve is going to be rather unusual this year in that a lot of people will not be out enjoying the festivities but will be at work to make sure that nothing goes wrong. at the reserve bank, we will have a team in place, including myself, and a communications centre to receive up - to - date information from financial institutions on what is happening. this centre will be linked to the commonwealth government ’ s national coordination centre in canberra and to various international networks that have been established. because australia ( and new zealand ) will be the first countries to enter the new millennium, there will be a lot of international attention focussed on us, including a fair bit of live television coverage to other countries about what is happening in australia. remember the united states will only be starting its working day on friday when we cross over into the new millennium. i am confident that australia will acquit itself well once again in the eyes of the world when the great day comes.

one authority, overlapping and mutual dependencies can always occur. consequently, it is very useful for the institutions to work together closely and engage in a certain amount of coordination. that is why the swiss authorities have clearly specified how they will differentiate their tasks and work together. from a purely theoretical point of view, a strategy where one institution bears sole responsibility for financial stability might be more appealing. however, experience from the financial crisis does not provide any evidence that the one - authority - for - all model is superior – in systematic terms – to other organisational forms. on the contrary. in this country, the ubs case clearly showed that it is very possible, in an emergency situation, to carefully and discretely draw up a bundle of comprehensive measures in support of financial stability, and to implement these in good time, even where various institutions are involved. bis central bankers ’ speeches exercising care and caution in uncharted macroprudential waters the authorities are sailing in uncharted waters when it comes to macroprudential measures. the complex interrelationships between monetary policy, traditional banking supervision and the macroprudential toolkit are difficult to assess. consequently, we do not always know exactly how the different measures will work. the need for analysis and research in this field is correspondingly great. however, to be realistic, we will never have all the answers or be able to dispel all uncertainties, as – incidentally – is always the case in monetary policy. but this should not stop us using these instruments when we judge it to be necessary. in doing so, we endeavour to exercise the requisite care and caution. consequently, we undertake comprehensive investigations, evaluate the results carefully and systematically, and carry out our measures based on criteria which have been specified in advance. as in the case of monetary policy, if decision - making is as free as possible from political influence and manipulation attempts, its quality will be improved. following these thoughts, i would like to return to my initial question concerning the snb ’ s role in financial stability, as a kind of interim conclusion. central banks have always had an important role in financial stability. however, the crisis has shown that the traditional approach, which relies exclusively on the power of persuasion and the extinguishing of fires, can be very expensive. consequently, it makes sense, in principle, for central banks to take on macroprudential tasks as part of their contribution to financial stability. however, because the situation