Certainly, financial stability reviews and other economic studies prior to the crisis contained some hints at shifts in the financial system. BIS, for example, gave repeated warnings about the setback potential stemming from the rapid growth in the credit securitisation and credit derivatives segments.
The ECB is conducting monetary policy in an incomplete monetary union, in which its policy has to be transmitted through 19 different financial and sovereign bond markets. The yields on those sovereign bonds provide the benchmark for pricing all other private sector assets in the 19 Member States – and ultimately also for ensuring that our monetary policy impulse reaches individual firms and households.