jan f qvigstad : comments on lars e o svensson's lecture " policy expectations and policy evaluations – the role of transparency and communication " speech by mr jan f qvigstad, deputy governor of norges bank ( central bank of norway ), at the conference " ten years of riksbank independence ", stockholm, 11 september 2009. * * * introduction it was a great pleasure to accept the invitation to discuss professor and fellow central bank deputy governor lars svensson ’ s lecture in connection with the tenth anniversary of riksbank independence. in his lecture, lars svensson discussed communication, credibility and monetary policy evaluation. he looks at general issues for central banks seeking to influence key rate expectations, using the riksbank as an example. 1 i will not venture to remark on the riksbank ’ s assessments but will offer my comments on the same issues in the light of norges bank ’ s experience of interest rate forecasts. there are a number of similarities between the communication strategies of the riksbank and norges bank. and underlying these strategies is a model developed by, among others, lars svensson. in his lecture today, he described how to arrive at an interest rate path that “ looks good ”. he showed, as he has on many previous occasions, that this can be formalised by finding the interest rate path that minimises a given loss function. when does the interest rate “ look good ”? svensson raises the issue of whether monetary policy is well balanced, not only ex - post but also ex - ante. in his presentation today, he presents a system for evaluating and ranking different policy alternatives, showing how taylor diagrams can be used to evaluate whether one interest rate forecast results in lower volatility in inflation and the output gap than another. if a forecast results in inflation closer to target and a narrower output gap through the forecast period, this forecast is selected. on other occasions, the choice between two forecasts can be more problematic. the forecast that is selected will depend on preference and the considerations that are given weight. i completely agree with lars svensson that policymakers must rank the different policy alternatives based on their preferences. in some cases, policymakers may wish to keep the interest rate high while in others a low interest rate may be preferred. however, it is equally important to take account of preferences over time, i. e. having a system to check whether the preferences underlying the baseline scenario in one report

yannis stournaras : “ european banking supervision : the first eighteen months ” welcome address by mr yannis stournaras, governor of the bank of greece, at the presentation of the book by dirk schoenmaker and nicolas veron : “ european banking supervision : the first eighteen months ”, athens, 14 july 2016. * * * we are really pleased and honored to have you here for the presentation of the study related to the first eighteen months of the european banking supervision. i strongly believe your work brings valuable insight in an era involving new policy regimes that have brought forward profound change to the european banking landscape. i also feel the work presented here today is essential as it provides an excellent overview related to ssm ’ s operations as well as the response to several challenges. needless to say if we were having this discussion a couple of years ago it would have been hard to anticipate that a major organization of this size would be fully operational at such an early stage and truly competent in dealing with major issues in the euro - area. it is equally important to understand that these challenges have not changed much over the past few years : asset quality deterioration, market segmentation and business model viability are still issues to be tackled by monetary policy and supervisory decision makers in our days. it is worthwhile examining a persistent characteristic during these years, indicative of these considerations : shares of european banks have been trading at a discount to tangible book value, while those of the largest us banks trade at a premium to book value. a comparison of capital - adequacy ratios can no longer explain this difference in valuation multiples, as capital ratios for euro area banks have risen from about 8 percent in 2008 to about 14 percent today. on the contrary, they are indicative of a european banking sector undergoing a transformation that demands a comprehensive and radical adjustment of the core business model of operation. i feel that, eight years after the financial crisis, we are still witnessing a transition phase. banks are definitely stronger than one decade ago, capital adequacy ratios do demonstrate that, but they are still adjusting their business models to a post - crisis world. at the same time, they also have to address legacy issues with problems of non - performing exposures adding to the overall assessment of investment considerations. the euro - area financial crisis, as originated in the end of the previous decade, provided the perhaps most serious challenge to the stability of the european union ; it is now well understood that a