are hugely excited about the programme and look forward to sharing the results of it in due course. conclusion in conclusion, i was greatly struck by something elizabeth mccaul of the ecb supervisory board previously said : " technology is fundamentally a human activitytechnology is neither good nor bad, but humans make it so. " 4 the reality is that no piece of legislation can contemplate every financial crime risk or typology or close every loophole. we can't wipe out financial crime – any more than we can wipe out car theft, shoplifting or burglary. but what we can do is to become as effective as possible at reducing its impact. hence, as technology evolves, it behoves regulators and supervisors to evolve too continually adapting to keep pace with these changes and ensure that, collectively and individually, we are the forefront of protecting the integrity of the financial system and those who use it. thank you. 1 behind the data – insights from irish payment fraud statistics 2 eba and ecb 2024 report on payment fraud 3 the 40 obliged entities will comprise the highest risk entities operating across the eu and at least one entity from each member state. 4 ecb supervisory board - technology is neither good nor bad, but humans make it so 5 / 5 bis - central bankers'speeches

##ation policies in order to avoid tensions. pierre werner, prime minister of luxembourg, and the central bank governors on his committee proposed an economic policy centre that would control national budgets, regional, structural and social policies. the whole process would be crowned by the single currency. when the bretton woods system collapsed and the oil crises erupted, national considerations put a stop to the werner plan. with the advent of the eu ’ s internal market in the 1990s, however, the issue of a common currency was revived. national currencies came to be seen as the last major barrier to the internal market ’ s full impact, which would pave the way to even greater european integration. to a large extent, the driving force behind the werner plan and the maastricht treaty was political. experience has taught us that institutionalised economic cooperation can be an antidote not just to trade conflicts but even to war. a common currency is a strong political symbol that can render cooperation durable in the daily economic round. instead of being just a topic for solemn speeches on television, european cooperation with a single currency could be something real that people carry around in their purses and pockets. but the maastricht treaty was, of course, also backed up by the strong economic forces that lay behind previous attempts at monetary union. by reducing exchange risks for firms, a single currency facilitates cross - border trade and investment. it also helps to integrate capital markets, rendering them larger and deeper, which aids the supply of corporate capital in europe. these considerable effects are accompanied by others that we ought not to underrate. in the present situation, moreover, they are likely to be enhanced by the internet and other new information technology. not the least of these is that the monetary union eliminates the psychological barrier that different currencies raise when we try to compare prices in different countries. the result is greater transparency and stronger price competition. price differences in europe today are twice as large as in the united states. the price of a small car, for example, can vary more than 50 % between eu member states. risk of countries getting out of step however, the road to greater cohesion is not necessarily smooth. in a monetary union, forces are at work that may cause member states to develop in different directions instead of converging. discussions about emu often raise the topic of asymmetric shocks, a technical term that stands for something quite simple. the conditions for the countries involved differ initially as regards their economic structures