Christian Noyer: France’s Prudential Supervisory Authority and Financial Markets Authority – enhancing the protection of French consumers Introduction by Mr Christian Noyer, Governor of the Bank of France, President of the Prudential Supervisory Authority (Autorité de contrôle prudentiel) and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Bank for International Settlements, at the ACP-AMF academic symposium, Paris, 11 May 2012. *  *  *  Dear Mr President, Ladies and gentlemen, I welcome you to this symposium organised today by the Prudential Supervisory Authority and the Financial Markets Authority. Before saying a few words on the subject of this morning’s discussions, I would like to say just how much Jean-Pierre Jouyet and myself are attached to fruitful collaboration between the two authorities that we preside. Since the creation of the ACP two years ago, the ACP and the AMF have united their efforts to durably enhance the protection of French consumers. A common division has been set up. Apart from the public information platform, Assurance Banque Épargne Info Service, which the general public is increasingly aware of, the two authorities have also conducted numerous consumer protection initiatives. For example, in 2010, the simultaneous publication of an ACP recommendation and an AMF guideline allowed the establishment of a framework for the marketing of complex products whatever their distribution channel. In order to limit the excesses sometimes encountered, these two texts underscored the need for contracts that are intelligible to non-professional consumers. In 2011, the number of jointly conducted control missions increased.
Late last year, as the long, dark winter closed in, there were considerable jitters in financial markets, with some observers fretting that the economy may be on the verge of a hard landing. Indeed, there was a lot of talk about the possibility of a recession looming. I am happy to report that the economy has emerged from the New York freeze. The sun is out, the tulips and the cherry blossom are now in full bloom and the picture of the economy is similarly rosy. In the first four months of the year, the U.S. economy added over 800,000 jobs, and the unemployment rate is now 3.6 percent—the lowest level in nearly 50 years. The latest GDP numbers indicate that the economy remained in high gear through the first quarter, with growth clocking in at an impressive 3.2 percent annual rate. Despite this very strong economy, we are not seeing any signs of inflationary pressures. In fact, the latest inflation data have come in lower than expected, with core inflation over the past 12 months dipping to 1.6 percent. Now, most people don’t seem that bothered by inflation that is a touch too low, but at the Federal Reserve we have set a long-run inflation goal of 2 percent. When inflation runs persistently above or below that goal, we take that very seriously. So far, the recent downward movement appears mostly to reflect normal volatility in inflation statistics.