*  *  *  Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to welcome all of you to the 41st Economics Conference of the Oesterreichische Nationalbank here in Vienna. My warmest regards to State Secretary of Finance Andreas Schieder, and our keynote speakers, Benoît Coeuré, Member of the ECB Executive Board, and Harold James, Professor at Princeton University.
I am delighted and honored to welcome very prestigious speakers among us, who will enrich this conference with their insightful ideas and novel research. “A Changing Role for Central Banks?” is the question addressed at this year’s conference. During the 19th century central banks were very closely interlinked with national governments.