for innovations. technology will not regulate itself. in whatever direction financial innovations are heading, we need to ensure that sector supervisors can continue to assume that a concrete entity will be responsible for future operational risks. because of the uncertainties involved, it is vital that developments are closely monitored. let me turn, now, to the growth potential of financial technology. i assume there is little doubt about the potential gains in terms of lower transaction costs, shorter delays and greater convenience. however, with regard to policy development, we should avoid entering a discourse that pits innovation against prudence. with a level - playing field and up - to - date - rules, i believe that we can trust market forces to work well in the long run. so, rather than bolstering innovation, we should first of all strive to remove superfluous hurdles. our regulation partly ignores digital realities, where participants interact differently than in an analogue world. legal ideas have to be adapted to digital contexts, and innovators need a reliable planning horizon. a consistent, long - term regulatory framework, synchronised on a european scale, would, in my view, be the best service we can provide to promote financial innovation. bis central bankers ’ speeches

##rrencies. this is reflected in a clear trend towards developing local assets ( mainly asia but also latin america ) and, consequently, in narrower spreads and stock markets hitting record highs – in short, it results in higher funding opportunities for the emerging world. such a process – which takes place gradually and is coupled with a transition towards a more diversified asset portfolio for central banks – offers great opportunities but also poses significant challenges for our countries, where financial development is incipient. although they exhibit advances, latin american countries appear to be lagging behind in terms of financial depth, not only compared to the developed countries but also when compared with other emerging economies like those in eastern asia. latin american countries exhibit a lesser relative degree of banking penetration. this situation reflects both supply issues and problems inherent to the demand side. these demand difficulties relate to a large degree of informality in corporate operations, or cultural issues which mean that at times the economic agents exclude themselves from this market on their own free will. bank loans to the private sector in latin america is typically below 30 % as fraction of gdp, while it is 175 % in uk, 167 in spain, and fluctuates closely to 100 % in france, japan, italy, canada, australia and germany. in emerging asia, where contract enforcement is probably better than in latin america, thailand´s ratio is 88 % and korea´s 100. the development of capital markets appears to be even more incipient. these markets are relatively illiquid, fragmented and incomplete, because the instruments that enable them to diversify ( or transfer ) risks are scarce, and, in particular, the capital markets are concentrated on government securities. indicators for 2004 show that while the turnover traded on the domestic capital markets was 6. 1 % of the gdp in latin america, it accounted for 92. 2 % in the g - 7 markets and for 104. 5 % in east asia. on the other hand, during that year equity financing was 0. 5 % of the gdp in the region, compared with 1. 5 % in the g - 7 countries and 5. 9 % in asia. between the years 1990 and 2004 latin america suffered a decline in the number of listed corporations which contrasts with the growth trend observed in the g - 7 countries and east asia. the domestic corporate bond markets exhibited a similar situation, as the amount of the bonds issued in 2004 was equivalent to 10. 7 % of the gdp in the latin american countries, compared with averages of 47.