still rules ’. bis quarterly review, march 2018. available at https : / / www. bis. org / publ / qtrpdf / r _ qt1803g. pdf. while the jury is still out on whether we will have a cbdc, the debate is already bringing benefits. many central banks, including banca d ’ italia, are experimenting with new technologies such as dlt and artificial intelligence, studying how they work and how they can be put to productive use. this research contributes to the advancement of the technological frontier, and helps make the financial system more resilient to technological and cyber risks. these benefits are here to stay, independently of whether one day we will live in a world with digital cash. designed and printed by the printing and publishing division of the bank of italy

product innovation and the reduction of unit costs must be to the benefit of firms and households. they must be turned into an improvement in the quality of the products supplied and be reflected in the prices of retail services, above all for payment services and asset management. in a period of low inflation it is only right for banks to limit the fees charged on retail services. progress in this direction, correct and professional conduct strengthen the relationship of trust with customers and are conducive to the orderly growth of intermediation business. in collaboration with the antitrust authority, we have launched a fact - finding inquiry with the aim of ascertaining the existence, for some services, of strategies and costs that discourage customers from changing bank. over the last ten years, the banking system has been marked by a process of consolidation and a progressive increase in the average size of individual intermediaries, whereas the industrial and service sectors have experienced further fragmentation, with inevitable adverse effects on the productivity and competitiveness of the whole economy. the number of large industrial groups, essential for the spread of new technologies, is limited. the system of industrial districts, which in past decades helped to generate the synergies and efficiencies typical of large groups within clusters of small firms, now seems less able on its own to sustain a further drive to improve competitiveness. the shortage of infrastructure and the cost of energy and services for firms are a drag at national level. spending on research by both the public sector and the private sector is particularly low in italy by comparison with the other advanced economies. the proportion of value added by high - technology sectors is very small. this affects italian products ’ penetration of international markets. italy ’ s share of world exports of goods and services in volume terms was approximately 4. 5 per cent in the mid - 1990s ; in 2004 it fell below 3 per cent. industrial production follows the performance of exports. for several years now, as we have documented on other occasions, its growth in italy has fallen appreciably short of that recorded both in the euro area as a whole and in the area ’ s two largest countries, germany and france. in 2004 italy ’ s index of industrial production showed a slight tendency to decline. to a degree, the transfer of traditional production to countries with low labour costs and rapidly expanding demand is normal. in italy the phenomenon has intensified since the mid - 1990s ; the number of workers employed in foreign companies invested in or controlled by italian firms has reached one