You will recall that the Managing Director, Mr de Rato, underscored the point when he characterised these developments in his recent speech to the Bretton Woods Committee, as a “torrent of change” 2 . Faced with this torrent of change, the alternatives are either swimming or sinking, as drifting is not an option.
4  See Cass Business School (2005). 2  BIS Review 124/2007  As far as public pensions are concerned, the introduction of notional defined contribution (NDC) pension systems in a number of countries, including Italy, goes in this direction. In principle, NDC systems can be designed to calculate pension benefits taking macroeconomic and demographic developments automatically into account.