gediminas simkus : speech at baltic aml forum 2021 speech by mr gediminas simkus, chairman of the board of the bank of lithuania, at the baltic anti money laundering ( aml ) forum 2021, vilnius, 12 october 2021. * * * check against delivery dear market participants, lawyers, financial intelligence and compliance experts, ladies and gentlemen : a very warm welcome to this year ’ s baltic aml forum. it is my great pleasure to see so many of you gathered here today to discuss the issues of assessing and properly managing the risks of money laundering and terrorist financing. i am pleased to see market participants and representatives of public sector both investing their time and resources in debating these issues. it gives me assurance that not only we have a common ground in prioritising prevention of financial crimes, but that we are willing to join forces in finding the best solutions. it is wonderful to have the minister of finance ms. gintare skaiste opening this conference. the ministry of finance is our core partner in founding the centre of excellence in anti - money laundering that was established this may – a platform to bring market participants and policymakers into a close dialogue. a quick overview on where we stand. technological advancements, such as blockchain, are disrupting the financial sector. there is no doubt that innovative business models in the financial sector are reshaping nearly every area of products and services, creating new opportunities and value for consumers and business. however, we must not forget that these developments also bring substantial new challenges, and can open gaps for misconduct to seep in. the united nations estimate that globally every year up to 2 trillion us dollars gets laundered. in the last few years some of the nordic - baltic jurisdictions were shaken with cases of the alleged systematic use of banks for money laundering. during the pandemic, the scale of money laundering and financial fraud has likely increased. we thus need to stay alert and search for ways to update and enhance our anti - money laundering and counter terrorist financing frameworks. i will now elaborate on our – the bank of lithuania ’ s – approach on dealing with money laundering and terrorist financing. the bank of lithuania constantly monitors and assesses vulnerabilities in market participants ’ risk control, anti - money laundering and terrorist financing prevention frameworks. in addition to inspections, numerous consultations, meetings with supervised entities are also made. we want to ensure that lithuania ’ s financial system has proper and sound risk management and

vitas vasiliauskas : investment and investment finance - lithuania welcome speech by mr vitas vasiliauskas, chairman of the board of the bank of lithuania, at the joint bank of lithuania and european investment bank webinar on investment and investment finance, 11 february 2021. * * * good morning, dear marco1, dear thomas2 colleagues, presenters and viewers, a warm welcome to this joint webinar organised by the bank of lithuania and the european investment bank ( eib ). allow me, first of all, to thank the eib for approaching us with the idea to hold this event. this is indeed a pivotal time to talk about investment. investment decisions that we make now will be crucial in both the short and the long run. let us begin with the short - term implications. according to the organisation for economic cooperation and development ( oecd ), gross fixed capital formation in the euro area fell by almost 11 % last year. this is a stark contrast to the us, where this decrease did not amount to even 2 %. in 2021, investment in the us will remain stronger as well. accordingly, gdp in the euro area is now projected to recover to the pre - pandemic level only towards the end of 2022. the us, meanwhile, is likely to make up for the lost ground already this year, whereas china ’ s output has not only fully bounced back – it has already returned to its prepandemic trend. europe should not be satisfied with such outlook. the euro area needs a stronger investment push to speed up our recovery and catch up with the other large economies. otherwise, painful long - term scarring effects will become unavoidable. public investment is key in this regard – especially in the current low - rate environment, characterised by historically low sovereign debt servicing costs as a share of fiscal revenue. as for the private sector, various surveys and reports show that uncertainty now stands as the largest barrier for private corporate investment. our estimations show that even in lithuania, despite its strong economic resilience displayed so far, private sector investment is likely to have fallen by almost 8 % in 2020. however, policy makers can address this issue. current research suggests that when firms grow risk - averse due to uncertainty clouding the future, public investment becomes much more effective than usual. not only does it have a higher multiplier, but it actually crowds - in private investment, rather than crowding it out