Against this backdrop, I am very happy to be here and to present today’s distinguished lecture on “The state as a banker?” The question mark at the end of the title signals that the state playing an active role as a banker is something which should be called into doubt.
And finally, it turned into the second decade amidst a spectacular, vertigo-inducing collapse of some global financial and trade structures that we started to take for granted. Even though Finland had not asked for any derogation when joining the EU, the decision to adopt the euro was not without challenges. Initially, there was a lot of scepticism.