of the us, the uk, and the rest of europe, which underlines market confidence in the solidity of the french financial system. we happen not to have pensions funds – which in this regard at least is an advantage –, and french insurance companies don ’ t make significant use of the same kind of derivatives that would imply margin calls. page 7 sur 11 these thoughts about financial stability bring me to a general remark about macroprudential policy in the present and new context of tightening monetary policy. when rates were low, macroprudential policy was essential to contain financial risks, allowing monetary policy to focus on the inflation and to remain loose as long as necessary. but now, how to revise our stance in a high interest rates environment with inflation above target? how to ensure that macroprudential policy can help in this context? if we release, we may contribute to the inflation dynamics through the usual credit channel. if we tighten, we can contribute to triggering financial risks. complementarity with monetary policy remains, but prudence is of the essence, and this could be the time for some macroprudential pause. ii. the case of the real - estate sector : how macroprudential tools help mitigate growing risks in france, our macroprudential body is the high council for financial stability ( hcsf ) : it ’ s chaired by the finance minister, but i as governor have the sole power to propose macroprudential measures to the council. it ’ s a subtle institutional balance … but it works. in recent years, we have used actively the countercyclical capital buffer ( ccyb ) : removing it in march 2020, reintroducing it at 0. 5 % in april this year, and planning to raise it at 1 % next december. as page 8 sur 11 the ccyb is always difficult to explain to public opinion, we also decided to rebrand it “ credit protection reserve ”. let me now focus on a practical case, on a sector that has often proved critical to financial stability, namely the real estate sector. it is politically most sensitive for citizens. severe financial crises have often been related to housing boomand - bust cycles : the great financial crisis was a stark example of this. lessons have been learned and a wide range of macroprudential tools have been implemented since then to mitigate vulnerabilities arising in the residential real estate sector, iii including in france and ireland. in december

cross - pollination between single - entity supervision and systemic oversight. the committee ’ s toolkit also includes recommended actions to be taken by the supervisors concerned. 4. closing existing information gaps successful macroprudential oversight is predicated on the responsible public authorities having all the relevant information they need at all times. this requires, in turn, that all systemically important financial institutions, markets and instruments be subjected to reporting requirements. in this context, the crisis has forcefully driven home the dangers arising from the fringes of the financial system. many different types of financial activities had been shifted to the shadow banking system and thus to an area that is not really regulated and about which only insufficient information is available. put simply, the agents in the shadow banking system include all those intermediaries which, like banks, conduct maturity, credit and liquidity transformation, yet do not have access to central bank liquidity or public sector credit guarantees. 1 among these are organisations such as structured investment vehicles ( sivs ) or conduits which have acquired a somewhat dubious reputation in connection with investments in securitised subprime mortgage loans. many market participants had previously been completely unaware of the existence of these vehicles and the extent of their activities. other members of this grey zone of the financial system include us money market funds and leveraged investors, such as hedge funds. although these actors were not at the forefront of the current crisis, they still represent a potential source of systemic risk, not least owing to their business relationships with large regulated banks. in individual, tight markets, they can also trigger and significantly amplify market reactions or act as a catalyst for a general reassessment of risks in the financial markets. this example serves to show that it is the type of business being conducted and not an agent ’ s formal status which should determine the type of regulatory treatment. we therefore also have to address and oversee those agents outside the classical banking system which perform a significant measure of similar intermediation functions, and subject them to adequate registration and disclosure requirements. these reporting obligations will not least provide data input for further research on systemic risk and possible channels of contagion. an internationally coordinated approach is necessary for any possible registration and disclosure requirements, as there is otherwise the danger that risky activities or products could flee to less regulated or entirely unregulated areas of the financial system and, in a crisis, come back to affect regulated markets. in this connection, we have to bear in mind that the