operating across national boundaries. its goal was modest : to make sure no bank could escape supervision. it did not try to harmonise supervisory standards. and, of course, it was primarily directed at supervisors, not banks themselves. in subsequent years, the committee pronounced on international lending and foreign exchange positions. these documents began to set expectations for the way in which banks should manage these risks, but they were not standards in the way we use the word today. it was the first basel accord that really marked this new role for the committee. as in 1974, a severe crisis triggered this step – in that case, the latin american debt crisis of the early 1980s, which raised the political pressure for banks to increase their capital base and for the regulators to create an international level playing field in this respect. since then, the committee ’ s role as a standard setter has only grown – to the extent that, today, this is seen as its primary purpose. whereas the committee took 10 years to publish its first 10 documents, this year alone it has published more than 30 – with more to come. but with all the public focus on standard - setting, it is important not to forget the critical “ behind the scenes ” role of information - sharing, since we all well know that regulation cannot be successful without strong supervision and cooperation to back it up. the second important influence on the committee has been the growing sophistication and complexity of international financial markets. the original basel accord was beautiful in its simplicity – something that many people long for today – but it could not keep up with the development of increasingly complex financial instruments. these may have offered substantial benefits to society, but they strained the simple basel i methodology. the committee ’ s response was most obviously manifested in basel ii. this marked another turning - point in the committee ’ s evolution, moving us from a “ one size fits all ” regime to differential approaches using internal models. this meant the regulatory regime was better aligned with banks ’ underlying risk profile, but regulation was now no longer simple or completely uniform across banks. like any change, it has delivered some undoubted benefits, but it has also created a whole new range of challenges that we are still grappling with today. the third key influence on the committee stems from increasing globalisation. as a creature of the g10, the committee could originally lay claim to coverage of most of the world ’ s truly internationally active banks. but as banks and financial markets became increasingly integrated across national

to have pushed down the interest rate on government bonds to a certain limit. however, there are no signs that this caused households and companies to encounter lower interest rates. it is therefore very unclear whether the result was that the economy was stimulated via the interest rate channel. 15 13 the market is dominated by so - called frn - bonds, where the coupon follows stibor 3 months. 14 erikson and vestin ( 2021 ) show a similar figure. some larger companies also finance themselves through the bond market. however, when the riksbank began purchasing government bonds, this form of financing was fairly unusual and accounted for only 22 per cent of the companies'total borrowing ( see the riksbank, 2014 ). moreover, it is common for companies'bond loans to have variable interest rates. as turnover in the market is small, it is difficult to follow price developments. nevertheless, the statistics indicate that rates on corporate bonds fell less than those on government bonds in 2015 and 2016. however, the lower interest rates could reasonably contribute to a lower central government borrowing cost, something i will return to in a moment. however, this was not the purpose of the riksbank's purchases. 7 figure 4. lending rates have followed the policy rate per cent note. the riksbank's policy rate and average lending rates from monetary financial institutions to households and companies, new agreements, all interest - fixation periods. sources : statistics sweden and the riksbank. unclear whether the riksbank's purchases contributed to the krona remaining weak one of the motives behind the riksbank's acquisition of assets was to avoid the krona strengthening in a situation where inflation was already too low. in that case, inflation would have been pushed down by lower import prices and the demand for swedish export products would have fallen. this would have brought down economic activity, which would have further dampened inflationary pressures. since other central banks also had large purchase programmes, the riksbank's intention was precisely to avoid the krona becoming too strong, not to weaken it. 16 it is hardly possible to say with precision how the riksbank's acquisition of assets affected the exchange rate. the analysis is complicated by, among other things, the fact that the riksbank published decisions on the asset purchases at the same time as decisions on the policy rate. 17 one indication that the purchases had the intended effect is that the krona did not strengthen but weakened,