keynote address : mr. jameel ahmad, deputy governor, state bank of pakistan 29th annual convention of the association of professional bankers colombo, 21 – 22 november 2017 h. e. dr. indrajit coomaraswamy, governor central bank of sri lanka ; mr. senarath bandara, president of the association of professional bankers ( apb ) – sri lanka ; distinguished members of the apb ’ s executive council ; esteemed speakers, dignitaries and guests ; ladies and gentlemen, good evening and ayubowan! it is indeed a great pleasure for me to be here today to address the 29th annual convention of the association of professional bankers ( apb ) of sri lanka. i have always enjoyed visiting this beautiful country and am a great admirer of the friendly relationship that both our countries enjoy. pakistan and sri lanka are time tested friends and share cordial bilateral relations which date back to as early as 1948. we have stood together and have shared strong cooperation with each other during difficult times. pakistanis are also grateful to the people and government of sri lanka for the visit of their cricket team to pakistan last month which is a major step towards the revival of international cricket in our country. pakistan and sri lanka also share excellent economic cooperation. pakistan is the second page 1 of 15 largest trading partner of sri lanka in south asia while sri lanka was the first country to sign a free trade agreement with pakistan, which became operational in 2005. i have no doubt in my mind that the bilateral trade between the two countries which is approximately usd 330 million today, has the potential to increase to more than usd 1 billion. i would also like to commend the role of central bank of sri lanka in fostering financial stability in the country and achieving decent economic growth. central banks of both our countries also regularly collaborate on saarcfinance which provides an excellent platform for exchanging ideas and lessons learned among central banks of saarc member countries. i hope that the experiences especially in today ’ s rapidly evolving banking and financial sector can further be shared as these are interesting times for central banks around the world. before sharing my thoughts on the main topic, i would like to felicitate the association of professional bankers of sri lanka for regularly organizing annual conventions on topics that are in sync with today ’ s changing realities and contribute to the debate on pertinent financial sector risks and challenges. the theme for this year ’ s convention i. e. “ changing dynamics : bank of the

efforts to address life insurers'potential liquidity risks and develop a liquidity stress testing framework for large life insurers through the naic's macro prudential initiative. the primary functional supervisor for insurance companies for which the board is consolidated supervisor is a state insurance regulator. it is just good policy for the authorities that mutually supervise firms to coordinate efforts in order to streamline, seek harmony, and minimize inconsistencies. to that end, in august of 2017, the federal reserve initiated contact with the naic and state insurance supervisors to engage in dialogue with the aim of achieving consistency, wherever possible, between the two capital frameworks under development. we have met frequently and engaged substantively with representatives of the naic and the states. input from the naic and the states has helped identify areas of commonality while remaining respectful of the somewhat different objectives of the relevant supervisory bodies and legal environments. some differences between the board's bba and the naic's gcc may arise. there are reasons for this. the board's mandate includes protection of a federally insured depository institution and the attendant safety - and - soundness objectives. as to a firm's insurance subsidiaries, the states'focus is on policyholder protection, while the board serves as the overall firm's consolidated safety - and - soundness supervisor. the board's capital standard also must comport with federal law for insurance holding companies with depository institution subsidiaries, while the naic's gcc interfaces primarily with state laws. moreover, because of the characteristics of the current population of insurance thrift holding companies, the bba currently would only need to scale between two regimes : the naic's insurance risk - based capital regime and federal bank capital rules. by contrast, the firms to which the gcc may apply can encompass operations in a number of non - u. s. jurisdictions, calling for a much more extensive set of scaling parameters. the naic has announced its plan to conduct a field test of the gcc this spring. likewise, to be transparent, gather additional input, and provide a valuable test of our approach, the federal reserve intends to conduct a quantitative impact study of the bba as part of our rulemaking process. we hope supervised firms will take advantage of this opportunity to contribute valuable information and feedback on our approach. our dialogue with the naic and state insurance regulators has been productive and helpful in the bba's development. moreover