compliance culture in place. one of our objectives is to create a supportive environment for a mature expansion of the lithuanian financial sector. we welcome market entry from those with truly sound technology, preparedness, adequate financial strength and risks management capacities. as the sector matures, becomes larger and increasingly more sophisticated, we, as a supervisor, will be attentive to the new challenges. we want our financial sector to be internationally 1 / 2 bis central bankers'speeches acknowledged not only for the quantity of market participants, but, first and foremost, known for the excellence in the quality of their services, risk management and control models, financial system stability. we seek to be a partner to the financial sector and help market participants in building capacity to prevent financial crimes from ever taking place. at the same time – let me be clear – we make no compromises on anti - money laundering and counter terrorist financing. and we do not hesitate to act if need be. having said this, we aim to strike a delicate balance here between risk management and derisking behaviour by the market participants. the latter happens when financial institutions avoid, rather than manage, risks by terminating business relationships with certain clients. effective risks management frameworks that allow timely prevention are the best cure against the vicious circle of de - risking and financial exclusion. is there room for national ambition in the area of anti - money laundering and counter terrorist financing? the simple answer is yes. for instance, further increase in lithuania ’ s ranking by the basel aml index and to make further progress towards meeting the 40 financial action task force ( fatf ) recommendations. still more work needs to be accomplished to reach compliance with all the moneyval recommendations ; work that must be done in close cooperation among various ministries, agencies and institutions. for instance, it is vital that a beneficial ownership register of lithuanian legal entities is completed as soon as possible. we must learn from the best practices from our baltic neighbours : only through close multiagency coordination and swift and efficient information sharing can we have the maximum impact in preventing and fighting financial crime. finally, having the new eu agency, the anti - money laundering authority – amla – here in vilnius would cement lithuania as the center of european aml expertise. let me draw your attention to the fact that just last week, on the 7th of october, the new european banking authority guidelines on money laundering and terrorist financing risk factors came into force in lithuania. these new guidelines aim at strengthening our defences by aligning the am

in a position to cut rates deeply to support recovery, we are now in a very different environment. while it is the case that our inflation rate was fairly modest for a long time, it clearly has moved higher quickly, necessitating larger rate hikes to move out of an overly accommodative stance. the tightening of monetary conditions, from exceptionally easy to neutral, is matched by fiscal actions to achieve a primary surplus and reduce the rate of growth in the public debt. these consistent policy actions are critical to further de - risk the economy in these more challenging global conditions. alongside a robust macroprudential regulatory environment, moving to a more neutral macroeconomic policy stance improves the risk - reward ratio for private sector investors, both foreign and domestic, 4 see bank for international settlements, annual economic report, 2022. 5 the us federal reserve has raised the federal funds rate by a cumulative 300 basis points since march 2022. the european central bank has hiked rates by a cumulative 125 basis points since july 2022 and the bank of england has also hiked aggressively in recent months. 6 the depreciation is largely on a bilateral basis, owing to the us dollar strength. on a nominal effective exchange rate ( neer ) basis, the rand has only depreciated marginally. and will lead to stronger investment rates over time. foreign and domestic capital have always played key roles in providing the financing of south africa ’ s needs. in the years of the global financial crisis and in the early weeks of the pandemic, risk aversion resulted in the sale of rand assets by foreign investors. this was complemented by resident savers shifting out of their foreign asset holdings and back into rand assets. as the global and domestic economy become less risky in the coming months and years, the build - up of these financial positions will occur again. foreign investors will re - enter south african markets ( and other emerging markets ) due to better real growth differentials and higher yields, while residents will rebuild diversified portfolios that include foreign assets. it is useful to remind ourselves that south africa ’ s financial markets are deep and robust, and well integrated with world markets. financial system assets are nearly 300 % of gdp, roughly three times the emerging market average. we were reminded during the early days of the pandemic of the need for central banks to provide appropriate backstops to financial markets. we do not want to create a moral hazard, either in the public or private sectors