##ncies, the governing council of the ecb intervened by unveiling, late in the summer of 2012, a new instrument, termed “ outright monetary transactions ( omts ) ”. with the omts, the eurosystem would undertake large - scale purchases of government debt under strict conditionality. although in fact it never became necessary to activate this instrument, its mere announcement led to much calmer conditions in euro area financial markets and to receding fragmentation, demonstrating the commitment of the ecb to do “ whatever it takes ” – to use the famous phrase of president draghi earlier that summer – to save the euro. subsequently, the euro area faced very low inflation rates, far below 2 %. again, the eurosystem initiated a multidimensional policy reaction, aiming to counter the fragmentation of financial markets in the euro area, which was fed by the sovereign debt crisis, as well as to revive the lending activities of banks. the eurosystem carried out targeted long - term refinancing operations ( tltros ), on favourable lending terms for those banks with the strongest credit expansion to the real economy, continued to cut key interest rates, and employed forward guidance. additionally, a large - scale purchase programme of private and public sector securities ( app ) was initiated in late 2014 and is unprecedented in scale at €2. 5 trillion last month. purchases 1 / 5 bis central bankers'speeches under the app are expected to run until the end of the current year, after which time the eurosystem will continue to reinvest the proceeds from securities maturing in its portfolio. to a large extent, these measures have helped improve financial conditions and the inflation outlook, and boost the recovery in the euro area1, while potential side - effects from the monetary policy easing, in the form, say, of excessive asset valuations or excessive risk - taking by market participants do not seem to have materialised. given that inflation pressures continue to be moderate in the euro area, substantial monetary policy stimulus shall continue to be provided in several ways, until the governing council assesses that developments regarding inflation are compatible with the eurosystem ’ s mandate. challenges for the future looking ahead, one main challenge relates to the formulation of monetary policy strategies by central banks in the aftermath of the crisis. will the strategies eventually converge to the pre - crisis status quo or will the “ new normal ” reflect some of the lessons learnt over the previous years? • according to the first approach, central

steps toward increased data and transparency in the u. s. treasury market. earlier this year, finra began releasing daily aggregate data on treasury market transactions, and at this conference last year, the u. s. department of the treasury announced plans to release trace transaction 1 / 2 bis - central bankers'speeches data for on - the - run nominal coupons. however, even with this progress, gaps in transparency remain. in march, the treasury markets practices group ( tmpg ), which is sponsored by the new york fed, put out a white paper on data availability and transparency in the u. s. treasury market that identified several gaps, particularly in the dealer - to - client cash market and the repo market. looking at the gap in the cash market specifically, there appears to be opportunity for improvement in providing transparency around transaction - level data. i am looking forward to the increased transparency in on - the - run transaction data that i mentioned earlier. looking further ahead, we should consider whether to take additional steps toward increased transaction transparency across the treasury universe, especially for the less liquid segments of the treasury market, such as the off - the - run market, where transparency is currently limited. the off - the - run market was the center of much of the dash - for - cash selling of treasuries that occurred in march 2020, yet there is little data on off - the - run trading available to the public, making it challenging for academics and others to study such stress events in detail. as we think about increasing transparency, it is important to exercise continued prudence, as there can be reasonable concerns about public transaction data, such as potential challenges that data may create around intermediating certain large trades. however, the success of public trace data transparency in the mortgage - backed securities and corporate bond markets provides guidance on how data can be shared without negatively impacting the market, such as displaying data with appropriate mitigation measures like time delays and capped trade sizes. in fact, academic research has generally found that the introduction of trace data transparency in these markets resulted in increased competition and reduced transaction costs. additionally, we can learn more about how to structure public releases of data on less - liquid securities by studying the future release of on - the - run transaction data. greater transparency into treasury market activity can support the market's many important roles : as a risk - free benchmark for financial instruments ; as a liquid investment and source of safe collateral ; as a channel