service businesses. it would be informative to examine how these new players could influence the structure of financial service provision, financial markets, and risk - sharing among various entities. from a central bank viewpoint, we need to closely monitor the impact of these new entrants so that new technologies will enhance the efficiency of payments, settlements, and financial services, while ensuring their safety and stability. second, new styles of systemic importance may emerge under the development of fintech. since the global financial crisis, efforts have been made to classify big banks as systemically important financial institutions, or sifis, based on factors such as the size of the balance sheet. based on these efforts, various financial regulatory measures have been taken so that their systemic importance would not threaten financial stability. recently, however, entities that provide global it platforms to many entities and accumulate huge volumes of big data have become increasingly powerful and influential in wide - ranging businesses including financial services. in addition, high - speed, high - frequency transactions in financial markets are expanding, and if many market participants come to use similar algorithms in conducting such transactions, this might involve the risk of amplifying one - way market developments. based on these changes in environment, rather than the size of balance sheets of banks, factors such as global it platforms, the huge volumes of big data, and widely used algorithms might become more systemically important from the viewpoint of financial stability. third, as the utilization of big data is becoming more important in the provision of financial services, data security, privacy, and the consensus of stakeholders on data utilization will become even more critical. thus, financial service providers and stakeholders are required to pay due attention to data protection and privacy, in order to maintain public confidence in innovative financial services utilizing new technologies. finally, as application of ai to financial operations is becoming widespread, ensuring governance in ai's decision - making and accountability to customers using ai - related services may also become critically important. if customers are concerned that ai's decision - making might turn into a " black box " and poses risks to them, such customers'anxieties would hinder the application of ai to create innovative financial services. in this regard, efforts to ensure the governance and accountability of ai are meaningful to " wipe out " people's concern about new technologies. iv. closing remarks in promoting fintech, france and japan seem to have common challenges as developed countries. in the case of emerging and developing countries, basic financial services are underdev

##mittance services for financially vulnerable people. moreover, robot advisers utilizing ai may provide easy - to - access asset management services with lower costs, and thereby promote " the shift from savings to investment, " which is a long - standing policy challenge in japan. in this way, fintech could contribute to raising growth potential and addressing social challenges, not only in emerging and developing economies but also in developed countries. on this basis, major cities such as paris and tokyo consider fintech as one of the major driving forces in the efforts of promoting financial services and industries. in november 2016, the metropolitan government of tokyo established the " advisory panel for global financial city tokyo, " in which a senior official of the bank of japan participated. in the discussion there, fintech, as well as fostering asset management services, were considered core drivers for promoting financial activities in tokyo. iii. initiatives at the bank of japan and the central bank's perspective the bank of japan is actively promoting fintech from the standpoint of a central bank. in april 2016, the bank established the fintech center within its payment and settlement systems department. the bank has also built up a bank - wide " fintech network " to share information and expertise related to fintech. also, the bank has held four fintech forums so far. in these forums, we have focused on topics of high interest, such as information security, open innovation, distributed ledger technology ( dlt ), and big data. in november 2016, the university of tokyo and the bank of japan held a joint conference focusing on the future of money. moreover, in april this year, the bank organized a conference on ai. furthermore, in order to gain deep understanding on new information technologies and their impact, the bank has been conducting various research activities, including the joint research with the european central bank on dlt. in parallel with these activities, senior officials of the bank, including myself, have been delivering speeches focusing more on it innovation and fintech as well as their impact on finance and the economy, in order to convey the bank's views on these issues. when we try to examine the impact of fintech on finance and the economy from a central bank's perspective, i think the following four points are important. first, entities which provide financial services are becoming widespread. one of the major characteristics of fintech is that various new players such as it companies and start - ups, which are different from traditional financial institutions, are entering financial