4  BIS central bankers’ speeches  A common understanding of the aim of monetary policy did develop when the monetary union was being set up; today, we have a clear and broadly shared consensus that the ECB should first and foremost pursue price stability. We have seen a similar approach and attitude increasingly being taken to financial regulation.
But this is not necessarily the case for those policies which, as I just mentioned, remain largely in the national domain but subject to European coordination. This is no coincidence.