Lord Mayor, as we prepare to toast the Bankers and Merchants of the City of London, we remember that the City is more than banking and that banking is much more than the trading of complex securities. So all of us here tonight would like to pay tribute to your work since you became Lord Mayor, to support your efforts to promote financial literacy, and to thank both the Lady Mayoress and yourself for the splendid hospitality which you have extended to us all this evening. So I invite you all to rise and join me in the traditional toast of good health and prosperity to "The Lord Mayor and the Lady Mayoress", Ian and Lin Luder. 4  BIS Review 76/2009
The paper envisages that whole classes of intermediary, such as custodians and CCPs, could become redundant, replaced by smart contracts. There is no likelihood of such an extreme revolution occurring any time soon: much more work is needed across a whole range of issues, including: speed and scaleability; confidentiality protections; developing common protocols; integrating cash and securities movements; and establishing regulatory and legal norms. In many cases, reform to outmoded business processes will need to precede any application of the technology itself. But there is clearly scope for less ambitious but still potentially transformational applications in specific markets, not least those where current infrastructure is less well developed. A key challenge for incumbent firms is whether to take on competition with challenger firms headon, or partner with them to develop and implement the most promising forms of technology internally. But doing neither is a risky approach. The final driver for change is regulation, which since the financial crisis has greatly increased the focus on centralised post-trade infrastructure as a means of promoting transparency and reducing system-wide risk. Amongst other things, banks and other financial intermediaries have been required to hold more high-quality collateral and be ready to mobilise rapidly across a wide range of businesses in response to margin calls. They have faced much stronger incentives to use centralised clearing and avoid settlement fails. And they have faced the need to support an increasing range of account types and reporting requirements. In turn, supervisors have increasingly expected infrastructure operators to act as systemic risk managers.