in relation to their possible cross - border use. the close interrelation between stable - coins and central bank digital currencies – due to their common transactional and store - of - value purposes, which are such that they may either complement or replace each other – warrant the importance placed on maintaining a holistic view of the payments sector. the late curzio giannini, my former colleague and author of one of the most insightful books on the history of central banks ( the age of central banks, 2011, 2004 in italian ), argued that “ in the case of money, the definition moves around the concept of payment technology : the set of conventions, objects and procedures that make possible the extinction of the relevant obligations of the exchange activity ”. we need to keep proceeding carefully with the examination of these conventions, objects and procedures, in line with our mandates of price stability and as guardians of the currency. after all, physical, electronic or virtual, the efficiency and stability of what we call “ fiduciary money ” is ultimately dependent on trust, on confidence – which indeed shares the same etymological root with “ fiduciary ”. and this is ultimately what we have to preserve. 3 / 3 bis central bankers'speeches

central bankers have extensively examined the relationship between public and private money. for example, in marcello de cecco ’ s book on money and the empire ( 1975 ) we read of the substantial efforts of english banks to prevent the bank of england from collecting deposits during the xix century. on the other hand, in 1999, at the jackson hole symposium held by the federal reserve bank of kansas city, discussing old and new challenges for central banks, mervyn king speculated that ( in a world of electronic transactions in real time ) without the centralisation of settlements “ central banks, in their present form, would no longer exist, nor would money ”. even more than the “ end of money ”, the consequence would have been the potential “ end of monetary policy ”, with the return to a pure exchange economy or the loss of central banks ’ monopolistic supply of base money that technology would have made possible. but the importance of a centralised system built around an outside money issued by the central bank, which preserves its value and acts as a lender of last resort, and an inside money, issued by the banking system in connection with its role of maturity transformation, has emerged forcefully during the pandemic. i would therefore like to focus on three questions. one striking feature of the pandemic crisis is that banks, thanks to the progress made after the global financial crisis, have been an important stabilisation factor. in many countries, for example, the banking system has been the vehicle through which government support measures ( such as guarantees and moratoria ) have reached households and businesses. on the other hand, some types of money - market mutual funds have experienced severe problems. they required the central bank to step in and are now under scrutiny. would similar problems have also emerged for providers of private money - like assets? even more striking has been the importance of monetary policy. not only have prompt and exceptional liquidity provisions preserved accommodative financial conditions, consequently preventing a generalised tightening of credit and averting the risk of a spiralling crisis, but also the measures enacted by central banks have allowed governments to access the financial resources needed to support households and firms without market tensions emerging. absent a monetary authority, would issuers of stable - coins have been able to maintain the stability of the financial system? and would they have been able to preserve the value of their currencies in both normal times and during a crisis? a third, fundamental, question concerns inflation.