tuomas valimaki : investment in times of uncertainty and unknowns opening remarks ( virtual ) by mr tuomas valimaki, board member of the bank of finland, at investment in times of uncertainty and unknowns conference, helsinki, 25 april 2022. * * * accompanying slides can be found on the bank of finland ’ s website. dear colleagues, dear friends, let me welcome you all on behalf of suomen pankki, the bank of finland, and our co - organisers from the european investment bank to this joint conference on investment in times of high uncertainty. today we will focus on investment needs and investment climate in finland. we ’ ll bring together a group of specialists on the topic, as well as an audience of economists, policymakers, as well as people from financial institutions and the business community. [ slide 2 ] finnish economy has recovered from the pandemic this seminar was planned to take place against the backdrop of the covid - 19 pandemic, from which the finnish economy was recovering rapidly. at the turn of the year the economy was growing at a brisk pace and employment was increasing swiftly. by most measures, our economy had filled the void caused by the pandemic. the progress with vaccinations and the lifting of restrictions had set the scene for the economy to continue its recovery over the near term, with importantly, a very promising investment outlook. on february 24th, when russia invaded ukraine, the previous forecasts became close to obsolete overnight. the war in ukraine has brought extreme misery to ukrainians. thousands of people are getting brutally killed. this is something my generation was hoping to escape from. from our conference ’ s standpoint, the war has also caused yet another source of extreme uncertainty to the finnish economy. to give some perspective to the investment landscape in finland, let ’ s jump some years back. [ slide 3 ] no recovery in the rate of business investment investment growth in finland has been relatively modest since the global financial crisis. although banks remained in good shape here throughout the crisis, global developments triggered a deep recession also in finland. compared to many of our european peers, the finnish economy recovered slowly from the 2008 – 2009 recession. in the aftermath of the crisis, private fixed investment in finland has stayed close to the level of the mid - 2000s. the rate of productive investment, i. e. investment as a percentage of gdp, declined drastically in 2008 and afterwards investment growth has been fairly subdued. moreover

##ntial policy would be best suited to address them. [ slide 27 ] transparency improves the accountability and effectiveness of monetary policy in january this year, when the governing council decided to expand its asset purchase programme, it also decided to publish a summary of that meeting ’ s deliberations before the next monetary policy meeting. the days of “ never excuse, never explain ” and central banks acting as opaque and secretive institutions were over for good. bis central bankers ’ speeches [ slide 28 ] transparency, accountability and efficiency : accounts of the monetary policy meetings a high degree of transparency is an important tool for an independent central bank like the ecb, as it facilitates accountability. we are accountable to achieve our mandate, price stability. by explaining the reasoning behind our monetary policy decisions and helping a better understanding of monetary policy we make it easier to attain our objective, facilitating efficiency. in mid - 2013, by introducing forward guidance and through 2014 conveying the governing council ’ s “ reaction function ” we increased our influence over the shape of the yield curve. when we had decided on our purchase programme in january, long - term nominal interest rates declined, as we had communicated our reaction function. we have emphasized that we will evaluate the likelihood for inflation not only to converge to levels that are closer to 2 %, but also to stabilize around those levels with sufficient confidence thereafter. the decision to publish an account of our monetary policy meetings was preceded by long and thorough discussions by the governing council. at the same time, we felt that even differences of views can be communicated without compromising the credibility and singleness of our monetary policy. such differences are quite normal and should exist in any committee having meaningful and analytical discussions. the accounts we decided to start publishing are intended to provide a richer summary and convey the flavour of the discussion among governing council members. in our view, providing a fair and balanced summary of the main arguments put forward was the best way to achieve this. the language we use reflects our collegiate, consensusoriented mode of discussion and decision - making. [ slide 29 ] let me conclude. the economic recovery in the euro area is broadening. ecb policies are working, as economic conditions in the short term are improving. other policymakers are responsible for their own efforts to strengthen the euro area economies and their potential growth in the medium to longer term. this will be achieved mainly by implementing structural reforms based on each country ’ s own needs and capabilities. it is, however, our task, especially now that the ec