central bankers'speeches especially useful was the electronic trading infrastructure for fx, which mas has been working with industry on for the last few years. we want the pricing and matching engines to be based here, and not have to wait for prices to be matched in london, new york, or tokyo, because there is still a time lag taken to route orders to these markets. sometimes there are execution errors with these lags, especially during periods of trading volatility. mas has gotten very good feedback on the growing electronic fx trading system in singapore. singapore has attracted key liquidity providers and platforms to base their pricing and matching engines here. we already have about seven banks and non - banks who have moved these activities to singapore. now, we have got another two global banks joining us. 2 so even during this period, we are seeing positive, encouraging developments on the fx front. upskilling industry workforce talent development and upskilling the industry workforce is another key area that mas has been focusing on during this period, so that finance professionals are able to function effectively and have a competitive advantage in the future. during this period of slower growth, mas has been working with financial institutions to retain their talent, use the opportunity to upskill their human capital, and explore ways to build longerterm capabilities in digital functionalities, so that the industry can emerge stronger from the crisis. last month, in april, mas announced a s $ 125 million package, basically to support smaller financial institutions and fintech firms, through the downturn. as part of this package, we launched a training allowance grant, which allows financial institutions, especially the smaller ones and fintechs, to make use of the downtime to train and deepen the capabilities of their employees. we also set up a new digital acceleration grant. the larger financial institutions are able to invest heavily in digital platforms and digital capabilities. the smaller ones do not have the capacity to do that. this digital acceleration grant will help smaller financial institutions and fintechs adopt digital solutions to strengthen their operational resilience during this period, improve their process efficiency, risk management, and customer service. the take - up has been very encouraging. more than 120 applications have come in. the first batch of applicants have already gotten their grants. new opportunities what does the future look like for financial services, post - covid? it is an important question that we are quite focused on at mas. a lot has been written about how the post - co

assess creditworthiness correctly and not withdraw financial support from solvent, creditworthy customers will be crucial. adequate and stable lending volume is essential to the banks themselves. in its first three - year refinancing operation on 21 december, the eurosystem supplied banks with a total of €490 billion. considering the contraction in the volume disbursed through other operations, the net increase in the resources provided to the banking system amounted to about €200 billion. this liquidity is circulating. most of the funds re - deposited with national central banks did not come from the same banks that had obtained them from the eurosystem. with this first three - year operation, italian banks received gross funding of €116 billion, corresponding to net refinancing of €60 billion. the inflow of long - term liquidity substantially eased the funding tensions. the second three - year refinancing operation, scheduled for 29 february, will further sustain the supply of credit. the operations of the eurosystem are currently on a full allotment basis ; banks ’ refinancing capacity accordingly depends on the availability of collateral. in recent months italian banks have significantly increased the collateral pool at the bank of italy, to about €280 billion at the end of january. their eligible uncommitted assets on the same date are estimated to have amounted to €77 billion after the application of haircuts. since the total exposure to the eurosystem amounted to about €200 billion, the italian banking system ’ s capacity for further refinancing can be estimated at more than €150 billion. following the recent decisions of the ecb ’ s governing council, we have joined other national central banks in announcing measures aimed at further expanding the range of assets banks can use as collateral for refinancing operations. in just a few days italian banks will be able to deposit a broader range of bank loans meeting clearly defined eligibility criteria, with the bank of italy bearing the related risks. to reconcile the objective of increasing banks ’ access to refinancing with the need to preserve the solidity of the central bank ’ s balance sheet, the new eligible collateral will be selected rigorously. in particular, it will include bank loans with a very low probability of default, not exceeding 1 per cent. as a result of the above changes, once haircuts have been applied, italian banks ’ total eligible assets will increase by another €70 – 90 billion to