amando m tetangco, jr : efforts to provide an integrated national payments and settlements system remarks by mr amando m tetangco, jr, governor of the central bank of the philippines ( bangko sentral ng pilipinas ), at the signing of the moa on the interconnection of pds settlement highway ( psh ) and bsp philpass, bangko sentral ng pilipinas, manila, 29 august 2007. * * * monetary board members ; mr. vicente castillo, ceo, philippine dealing system holdings corp ; mr. ramon sy, president, bankers association of the philippines ; guests from our partners in the banking sector ; bsp officials ; our friends from the media ; ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon! today ’ s moa signing is another landmark in our joint efforts to provide an integrated national payments and settlements system. as partners in the financial reform agenda, we have all vigorously worked together to have the various pieces of the payments puzzle be put together. in the process, we continue to work towards the establishment of the infrastructure that would allow the secure and timely completion of transactions to reduce systemic risk in the financial markets and thereby enhance the integrity of financial transactions. in the course of the last five years, the bsp ’ s philpass has been interconnected with the check and peso clearing results of the pchc, the delivery vs. payment of government securities transactions of the bureau of the treasury, the atm transactions of the megalink member banks, and the payment vs. payment ( foreign exchange ) transactions of the philippine dealing exchange. to date, all the commercial banks and 50 % of the thrift and savings banks and some non - banks performing quasi - banking operations settle these various transactions in the philpass. with the signing of the memorandum of agreement for the interconnection of the philippine dealing system holdings corporation ’ s settlement highway with philpass, all the payment instructions for transactions that would be done through the pds group could now be transmitted directly to the bsp - philpass and effected in the ddas of the counterparties who are philpass member banks or through the ddas of the philpass member bank in their capacity as settlement banks for non - philpass members. these transactions include foreign currency transactions, interbank and interdealer repo transactions, and interbank fund transfers. it is also worthy to note that this interconnectivity comes at very minimal cost. this is because the infrastructure

##20 billion worth of dividends to national treasury. in all, we have so far injected p1. 5 trillion in liquidity into the financial system, equivalent to 7. 6 percent of gdp. the bsp ’ s crisis response toolkit also includes a long list of time - bound regulatory relief measures meant to help banks withstand the crisis. we did all these so that they, in turn, can help vulnerable sectors cope with the crisis as well. as the economy recovers, we intend to further strengthen our existing surveillance systems to gain a sharper and more nuanced view of developments in the economy. in the pursuit of the bsp ’ s objective of promoting financial stability, the bsp utilizes economic and financial surveillance dashboards and models to inform policy - making. as a complement to these tools, the bsp recently launched two important projects which will enable us to gain more access to high - quality and granular information. these are the ( 1 ) fi portal which is an online secure web - based facility that will replace email submission of reports, and ( 2 ) bob or the bsp online buddy which is a chatbot designed to respond to consumer concerns. apart from this, the bsp also regularly conducts ad hoc surveys and actively participates in industry forums to ensure that we are informed of important developments in a timely manner. the bsp ’ s toolkit goes beyond short - term fire - fighting measures. to ensure that the green shoots materialize into balanced and sustainable economic growth, the bsp has actively advocated for and worked on the implementation of structural reforms. we see three key reform areas which are crucial to reinforcing the country ’ s strong macroeconomic fundamentals. these have the capacity to revolutionize the ways by which consumers, enterprises and financial markets operate in a manner that promotes the principles of responsible leadership and environmental stewardship. these are the enactment of enabling legislation and infrastructure, the promotion of digitalization and sustainability initiatives. the bsp is working with both houses of congress on the enactment of the following key legislation : the financial institutions strategic transfer ( fist ) act will assist the financial system in performing its role of efficiently mobilizing savings and investments toward productive sectors of the economy. 3 / 5 bis central bankers'speeches the government financial institutions ( gfis ) unified initiatives to distressed enterprises for economic recovery ( guide ) bill seeks to strengthen the capacity of government financial institutions, including : the land bank and the dbp in providing the needed assistance to msmes