*  *  Introduction  Ladies and gentlemen It gives me great pleasure to speak to you here today at the Handelsblatt Annual Conference on the topic of new developments in banking supervision.
Carnival season begins today, 11 November at 11.11 am – but to those of you who are hoping for a traditional, witty Carnival speech at this point, I’m afraid I’m about to let you down. Besides, 11 o’clock is still a good couple of hours away. Nonetheless, I think we should begin on a light-hearted note.