roskilde bank's operations. representatives of any association or similar organisation that may be established by old shareholders in roskilde bank to safeguard a significant part of their interests would be welcome to participate in regular meetings to discuss the activities of the new bank and the discontinuation process in general. i would like to emphasise that this is indeed an extraordinary situation. roskilde bank suffered from very substantial exposure to the property market, unfavourably combined with a lenient credit culture. as a result, the bank was unable to survive on its own, and we had to step in to ensure responsible discontinuation.

the needs of its members. surely, asian economies cannot decouple from the global economy as we still depend considerably on other economies outside the region. however, i believe that post asian crisis regional integration and cooperation have helped most of our regional economies to stand by each other amid the turbulent environment. ladies and gentlemen, although the regional economies have become increasingly more resilient and have focused on fostering effective regional crisis prevention and management mechanisms, we still need to be vigilant about the on - going risks. moreover, there are important lessons from this crisis that we need to take into consideration in choosing the direction and pace of further economic integration in the new environment. first, while innovations and the removal of barriers to cross - border activity have expedited global capital market integration, they could also bring about complexities, less transparency, and therefore greater possibility and magnitude of systemic risks. sophistication of financial products has led to inadequate understandings of market players as well as lack of transparency in certain securities markets and intermediaries. one notable example is the unregulated and non - standardized markets for structured products where a fair evaluation of the instruments as well as of the counterparty risk has been very difficult, not only for market players but also for supervisors. second, the current financial crisis demonstrates the amplifier role of the financial sector in a boom - bust economic cycle. in the environment of fast credit expansion, rising capital inflows, and lack of proper regulation, the inherent procyclical nature of the financial sector has contributed to one of the unprecedented build - up of financial imbalances in the us during the boom and a disorderly unwinding of these imbalances during the bust. third, the crisis also raises a crucial question about the role of monetary policy in maintaining macroeconomic and financial stability. the important question is whether monetary policy should be employed to help deter the build - up of asset price bubbles apart from the macroeconomic stability objective. and fourth, asian financial markets have been more susceptible to negative events in the major financial markets. volatilities in the regional financial markets have increased, driven increasingly more by actions of international investors. we have witnessed large capital reversals during the periods of risk aversion as their investment positions were unwound both in the stock and bond markets. ladies and gentlemen, these four important lessons will be important inputs for us while we cautiously proceed with further integration. this crisis experience clearly shows that a financial crisis