for overall consistency to prevent regulatory arbitrage under the “ same activities, same risks, same rules ” principle, and also to address risks that fall outside existing frameworks, including risks for fair competition and for transmission of monetary policy. indeed, in july 2019, g7 finance ministers and central bank governors agreed that possible stablecoins initiatives must meet the highest regulatory standards, be subject to prudent supervision and oversight and that possible regulatory gaps should, as a matter of priority, be assessed and addressed. accordingly, at global level, several groups are working on a global regulatory and supervisory approach towards crypto - assets and a g7 working group is finalizing a report investigating specifically the impact of global stable coins, which should be published shortly. 3 - but adapting the regulatory framework might not be enough. to preserve the advantages of multiple issuers of settlement assets in providing innovative, efficient and safe means of payment, central banks as issuers of the reference settlement asset may contribute further in revisiting and improving the conditions under which they make available that settlement asset. in that perspective, a possibility regularly mentioned is that central banks issue their money in digital form, the so - called concept of central bank digital currency ( cbdc ). it is important here to draw a distinction between a retail cbdc, accessible to the general public, and a wholesale cbdc, accessible only to financial intermediaries. as regards retail cbdc, different motivations to introduce it can be considered. one motivation could be for instance the need to cope with a significant demand for digital payment solutions and avoid that the supply be ensured only by private payment structures ( e. g. libra ) or a non - euro area cbdc, which may achieve significant market power, thus posing risks to security and financial stability. another motivation could be the political will to ensure the accessibility of central bank money for the general public, in particular in countries where the use of cash in payments is declining. there may be other reasons. but my feeling is that, at this stage, the “ business case ” for pushing a retail cbdc at the scale of the euro area is somehow weak. i don ’ t believe anyhow that such an initiative should be conceived as a mean to counterbalance private initiatives such as libra, keeping also in mind that the weaknesses the latter intends to address in cross - border payments may not be more easily handled by such cbdc. furthermore, the macroeconomic implications of the issuance of a

economy. furthermore, high levels of uncertainty persist, including from brexit and trade tensions between the u. s. and china. inflation remains subdued. wage pressures have increased somewhat during the upswing, as labour markets have tightened. but the passthrough to inflation has not yet materialised. core inflation in the euro area has fluctuated around 1 per cent since 2015. part of the explanation for persistently low inflation may be related to globalisation. global rather than national labour supply is playing an increasing role in domestic inflation. in the aftermath of the financial crisis, monetary policy played a key role in supporting the recovery with both conventional and unconventional measures. the result is well - known : very low interest rates in many economies and large central bank balance sheets. in denmark, the key monetary policy rate has been negative since 2012 with the exception of a few months. now, the next slowdown may hit the european economy before monetary policy has had a chance to normalise – although our definition of " normal " has also been called into question. in recent months, central banks across the world have once again adopted a more dovish stance. this reflects the weakening of economic activity, increasing risks to growth, and subdued inflation. i do not subscribe to the view that central banks have run out of ammunition. but considering the starting point, monetary policy may be side 2 af 7 hard pressed to play as prominent a role in support of the economy as during previous downturns. in that light, it is even more important that fiscal buffers are built in good times. higher public debt sustained by central banks is not a long - term solution. structural factors put downward pressure on interest rates to further complicate matters, market rates are not only being held down by monetary policy, but also by structural factors. while low inflation is playing a part in keeping nominal rates low, real interest rates are also low. at danmarks nationalbank, we have attempted to estimate the natural real interest rate – called r * – for denmark. r * is defined as the real interest rate when the economy is growing in line with its potential. these estimates are associated with considerable uncertainty. but it is wellestablished that r * has been on a declining trend over the past couple of decades. we find that the natural rate in denmark has declined by about 4 percentage points since the mid - 1990s. it became negative during the financial crisis. we expect that r * will remain low in the coming years and