Allow me to recapitulate the consequences in a few words: various banks, stock brokerage firms and securities houses lost part or even all of their staff, their business premises, their backup facilities and their lines of communication. The markets remained closed on the following day, the equity markets even until the end of the week. From a systemic point of view, of even greater consequence than the closing of the equity market was the fact that the two markets for US government paper and for commercial paper, the main vehicles for short-term liquidity equalisation between market participants, had ceased to operate. Payment and settlement systems started to break down. Securities and credit balances totalling billions were thus blocked at some banks while lacking at others. Even though the terror attacks were concentrated on New York and Washington, in the beginning they not only paralysed Wall Street but they also threatened to undermine significant parts of the international financial system. It is much too soon, and this is not the proper place, to make an assessment of the profound human, social and political implications of the terror attacks. The resilience of the banks and the financial markets must be emphasised, however. A week after the attacks, business was almost back to usual again. In most cases, the banks and securities houses affected managed to solve their problems, some of which were immense. Neither a stock market crash nor a breakdown of parts of the financial system set in either in the United States or anywhere else.
In particular, the Fed communicated clearly from the very beginning that it would meet the increased requirements for dollar liquidity at any time. BIS Review 101/2001  1  Against this background it is not surprising that the terrorist attacks on the United States failed to seriously impair the functioning capacity of the financial markets either in Switzerland or in the rest of Europe. Even though the global financial system had been hit in its very core, the extensive transmission of problems that was theoretically possible did not take place. This is not least due to the fact that the institutions concerned on both sides of the Atlantic comported themselves in an appropriate manner, as did the central banks. The biggest immediate problem for some Swiss banks is likely to have been the inability to act of a major correspondence bank in New York that was hit by a simultaneous power failure in the main supply and the backup system. In such cases, liquidity requirements soar. The Fed's generous supply of USD liquidity to the market also benefited Swiss banks. We did not, however, observe a similarly higher demand for Swiss franc liquidity. Nevertheless, the Swiss National Bank was, of course, present in the CHF money market. (Cf. the remarks of Bruno Gehrig.) For the time being, I would sum up the situation as follows: 1. The terror attacks of 11 September 2001 did not succeed in destabilising either the US part of the international financial system or those of the rest of the world. 2.