Responding to the very difficult economic and financial challenges we face, the Federal Reserve has gone beyond traditional monetary policy making to develop new policy tools to address the dysfunctions in the  3  For links and references, see Ben S. Bernanke (2009), "Federal Reserve Programs to Strengthen Credit Markets and the Economy," testimony before the Committee on Financial Services, U.S. House of Representatives, February 10.
6  BIS Review 19/2009  nation's credit markets. We have done so in a responsible way: The credit risk associated with our nontraditional policies is exceptionally low, and, by carefully monitoring our balance sheet and developing tools to drain bank reserves as needed, we will ensure that policy accommodation can be reversed at the appropriate time to avoid risks of future inflation.