. and villegas - sanchez, c. ( 2017 ), “ capital allocationand productivity in south europe ”, quarterly journal of economics, 132 ( 4 ) : 1915 – 1967. 5 see adalet mcgowan, m., andrews d. and millot, v. ( 2018 ), “ the walking dead? zombie firms and productivity performance in oecd countries, ” economic policy, 33 ( 96 ) : 685 – 736. 6 see altavilla, c., canova, f. and ciccarelli, m. ( 2019 ), “ mending the broken link : heterogeneous bank lending and monetary policy pass - through ”, journal of monetary economics ( forthcoming ) and kayshap, a. and stein j. ( 1994 ), “ monetary policy and bank lending ”, in mankiw, g. ( ed. ), monetary policy, studies in business cycles, 29 : 221 – 56, chicago, university of chicago press ; van den heuvel, s. ( 2002 ), “ does bank capital matter for monetary transmission? ”, economic policy review, federal reserve bank of new york, may, 259 – 265. 7 see budnik, k. ( 2019 ), “ abird ’ s - eye view of the resilience of the european banking system : results from the new macroprudential stress test framework ”, macroprudential bulletin, 7 ( march ), european central bank. 8 see altavilla c., boucinha, m. and peydro, j - l. ( 2018 ), “ monetary policy and bank profitability in a low interest rate environment, ” economic policy, 33 ( 96 ) : 531 – 586. 9 see andersson, m., kok, c., mirza, h., more, c. and mosthaf, j. ( 2018 ), “ how can euro area banks reach sustainable profitability in the future? ”, special feature, financial stability review, november, european central bank. 10 see brand, c., bielecki, m. and penalver, a. ( eds. ) ( 2018 ), “ the natural rate of interest : estimates, drivers, and challenges to monetary policy ”, occasional paper series, no. 217, ecb, frankfurt am main, december. 11 see, for example, holston, k., laubach, t. and williams

, a problem in recent years lies in the composition of investment, which is relatively strongly tilted towards construction ( “ investing in walls ” ), while ict investments have been low compared to comparison countries. in the years of the rise of the electrical and electronics industry in finland the share of investments in intellectual property products ( ipp ) of all fixed capital investment increased markedly. however, the rapid growth in finnish ipp investments ended at the time of the global financial crisis whereafter their volume even decreased for several years. although they resumed growth in 2017, their volume is still somewhat lower than in the previous peak year 2008. ( see external link. ) 1 / 4 bis central bankers'speeches in a recession, weak consumption and export demand will also dampen the demand for fixed investment as companies curtail activities. although cyclical demand is important, the weakness of investment may reflect a number of factors. [ slide 4 ] uncertainty the sluggish growth in investment may be explained by uncertainty. indeed, recent years have been characterized by episodes of global uncertainty. brexit, trade disputes between the united states and china as well as geopolitical uncertainty in several regions may have eroded the investment appetite of export companies. these, too, are examples of cyclical demand factors. the weak growth in investment may also be explained by supply - side factors. these are typically structural factors that have an impact on the medium - term prospects for return on investment. it is possible that companies and investors consider the outlook for productivity growth in finland to be subdued. the shrinking of the working - age population and structural changes in the economy, with a shift from a manufacturing economy towards a services economy, are structural factors that may explain the lack of investment. all these factors may weaken investors ’ expectations regarding return on investment. due to the simultaneous impact of demand and supply factors as well as global uncertainty on investment, it is difficult to assess their relative importance. in a recent bank of finland study, socalled structural vector autoregressive ( svar ) models are applied to disentangle the various effects. according to the results, it is clear that global uncertainty has had, a significant role in the development of finnish investment. the results show, however, that fluctuations in uncertainty explain only to a minor degree changes in investment growth in the short term, covering a couple of quarters. instead, they explain a quarter of fluctuations in investment growth in the medium to long term. the difference may be a result of