currently. 2 • economic and financial globalization has been one of the main characteristics of the world economy in recent years. this has been the source of many benefits, but it has also been accompanied by new challenges. in particular, as the global financial crisis ( gfc ) has clearly shown, the growing interdependence that has resulted from globalization means the economic problems of one country can be rapidly transmitted to others. in this context, policy options that are apparently reasonable shares based on ppp ‐ adjusted figures for gdp. figures provided by, or calculated with data from, international monetary fund ( 2015 ) : world economic outlook database, october. see also mohan, rakesh and muneesh kapur ( 2015 ) : “ emerging powers and global governance : whither the imf? ”, imf working paper no. wp / 15 / 219, october. bis central bankers ’ speeches at the national level are not necessarily so when adopting a global vision. therefore, a highly globalized world presents the typical prisoner ’ s dilemma, where a non ‐ cooperative approach leads to poorer results for all the parties involved as opposed to one based on cooperation. in other words, the nature of today ’ s challenges underscores the need for a framework of global governance with a much higher level of cooperation and, consequently, a level playing field. • the gfc brought to the forefront many of the limitations of the governance framework in place. to start with, it showed that contrary to the then prevailing views, advanced economies ( aes ) are at least as vulnerable to crises as emes. it also made clear that no effective mechanisms were in place to ensure consistency between the economic policies in the main advanced countries and global economic and financial stability. naturally, this gave rise to serious concerns about the legitimacy of the existing global economic governance arrangements. to put it in jean ‐ claude trichet ’ s words, “ … the industrialized countries have proven particularly clumsy in their handling of global finance before the crisis at a time when their responsibility in global governance was obviously overwhelming. there was therefore no reason to confirm their exclusive prime responsibility ”. 3 the gfc sparked an effort of cooperation of the international community, unprecedented in terms of its complexity and reach, which allowed to prevent the collapse of the global financial system. in addition, as a result of the crisis, major steps were taken to adjust the global economic governance structure. in particular, emes were given a more prominent role in the global decision

##s a gradual recovery that will gain strength towards the second half of this year. consistently with this scenario and the board ’ s statement, market expectations for the monetary policy rate ( mpr ) have ruled out new cuts and, in some cases, point at a cycle of increases beginning late this year. in what follows i will describe the macroeconomic scenario we believe to be the most likely for the coming quarters, and its associated risks. macroeconomic scenario the external environment and related risks remain largely determined by the impending monetary normalization process in the united states. changes in expectations about when and how fast it will finally occur have affected world financial markets significantly. by contrast, in the eurozone and other developed and emerging economies, monetary policy has become more expansionary, largely responding to the lower inflation figures and lower bis central bankers ’ speeches medium - term inflation outlook. such scenario is quite opposite to what we are seeing in chile and latin america in general. the eurozone showed a more stable output trajectory towards the end of 2014, driven by germany. preliminary first - quarter figures suggest that germany will continue to lead the bloc. it is also worth mentioning that in 2014 spain posted positive gdp figures after three years in recession. meanwhile, italy and france continue to show meager results. all in all, in the past few months the region ’ s growth prospects have improved. in our baseline scenario, we expect the eurozone to grow 1. 5 percent this year, up from 1 percent in december. still, there are some risks relating to the political situation, especially what may happen in greece. about latin america, there is a marked deterioration of the region ’ s economies, which is compounded with lower commodity prices and in some countries, public and private expenditure imbalances. so while the main economies in the region grew on average nearly 4 percent between 2010 and 2013, in 2014 they barely grew 0. 7 percent in 2014 and are expected to grow by 0. 8 percent this year. by countries, the biggest correction goes to the brazilian forecast, which the market expects to post a gdp drop of 0. 7 in 2015, its worst in several years. the greater relative strength of the united states, plus the ever closer beginning of its monetary policy normalization, has prompted a substantial appreciation of the dollar in recent quarters. for sure, news about the situation of the us economy plus the fed ’ s statement has caused important swings in the dollar price in the past few weeks. this has reflected in