hans georg fabritius : the new target2 system and recent developments in european securities settlement welcoming address and keynote speech by dr hans georg fabritius, member of the executive board of the deutsche bundesbank, at the target2 conference, frankfurt am main, 15 november 2006. * * * good morning ladies and gentlemen, i would like to welcome you very warmly to the bundesbank ’ s target2 conference organised as part of euro finance week. today ’ s conference will focus on two topics : the new target2 system, launching in exactly 369 days from now, and recent developments in european securities settlement. both are key components of europe's financial infrastructure and constitute a primary duty for a central bank : namely, to ensure that payment and securities settlement are both efficient and secure. central banks can achieve these objectives by assuming various roles including operating their own systems, acting as a catalyst and performing an oversight function. a not insignificant number of experts expect central banks to withdraw from operational activities in the long term and limit themselves to overseeing private payment and securities settlement systems. proponents of a less active role for central banks have a motto : “ let the market decide ”. they believe that, as public bodies, central banks should concentrate on ensuring an efficient operational framework. otherwise, as “ authorities ” and “ monopolists of central bank money ”, they risk distorting private competition and hence restricting it. however, the question we need to ask ourselves is this : in a competitive economy with a stable private sector, why should central banks operate their own systems at all? i central banks do have a monopoly over the supply of central bank money. even though the term monopoly rightly has negative connotations, one thing is clear : in this context, it makes perfect sense. total control over the provision of central bank money is key to modern monetary policy and is therefore essential if we are to achieve our primary task of safeguarding monetary stability. in addition, central bank money is also a byword for security and liquidity. in other words, no credit risk and maximum availability. this also makes central bank money especially suitable for settling financial obligations, particularly individual payments and securities transactions. the necessary systems must remain under the control of the central banks. monetary policy aside, there are a number of other reasons why this is the case. • first, it allows us to make a significant contribution to financial stability. in times of crisis, it is particularly important to react rapidly and discreetly

lisa d cook : welcoming remarks - 5th annual conference on " nontraditional data, machine learning, and natural language processing in macroeconomics " welcoming remarks by ms lisa d cook, member of the board of governors of the federal reserve system, at the 5th annual conference on " nontraditional data, machine learning, and natural language processing in macroeconomics ", washington dc, 13 november 2023. * * * good morning, and welcome to the 5th annual conference on " nontraditional data, machine learning, and natural language processing in macroeconomics. " 1 in a world with evolving data sources and significant advances in computing, it is important to constantly improve the conceptual framework that macroeconomic policymakers use to inform their critical decisions. this conference brings academics and practitioners together to think carefully about that framework and to push for advancements that could lead to improved economic outcomes. the federal reserve hosted the inaugural edition of this gathering in 2019. since then, the conference has evolved into an international partnership between academics, central banks, statistical agencies, and international organizations, with the bank of italy, the bank of canada, and the swedish riksbank hosting recent editions. the conference is also now jointly organized with the central bank research association and the economics with nontraditional data and analytical tools program, which will further enhance its international scope. we are grateful for the international and domestic partnerships that have emerged from this event and its predecessors. today, we have about 90 in - person participants in attendance, representing 30 agencies and foreign central banks. as we continue to leverage new data and master emerging techniques, cooperation between those that provide the statistics, those that base policy upon them, and those that leverage the latest methodologies to understand them will be of paramount importance. coordination between statistical agencies and policymaking institutions helps us achieve our shared goal - a better understanding of the economy. from our own institutional perspective, the federal reserve uses a broad array of government and private - sector data to continually assess the state of the economy, inform our outlook for economic activity, and evaluate the risks around that outlook in pursuit of our dual mandate of maximum employment and stable prices. not surprisingly, the emergence of nontraditional, high - frequency data was integral to better understanding the real - time effects of the covid - 19 pandemic and its economic consequences. 2 in the current environment, we employ a wide variety of tools and techniques to best distill useful signals related to inflation and the labor market from the