Our regulations, which restrain the banking business operational, liquidity or market risks, are in full compliance with the international standards, providing at the same time enough room for the development of the interbank market. We have also taken major steps in terms of the institutional development of this market, through the establishment and maintenance of TRIBOR and TRIBID reference rates, through constant communication with the dealers’ association and promotion of new interbank market instruments. I would like to inform you today of the last Bank of Albania’s step in this regard, and also ask for your greater attention in terms of taking prompt actions that will boost the activity and role of the interbank market. Change of the Bank of Albania’s operational target framework The Bank of Albania is in the final phase of reviewing its operational targets. The latter will soon change their form, shifting from the quantitative targeting of the Bank of Albania’s balance sheet to the targeting of interbank market interest rates. The operational targets of monetary policy play a key role in the formulation and conduct of monetary policy. In a theoretical background, these targets serve as a link between the monetary authority’s interventions in the interbank market and the intermediate target of monetary policy. Thus, the operational targets serve as the starting point of the monetary policy transmission mechanism. In practice, these targets serve to steer and discipline the monetary authority’s interventions in the money market quantitatively.
The BNB Governor also outlined the second work block in this direction, on which the BNB is currently working, i.e., the overall framework of determining the amount of funds to be contributed by banks to the Single Resolution Fund and the amount and way of transferring funds from the Bank Resolution Fund in Bulgaria, which was set up in 2015, to the Single Resolution Fund. The third work block covers the overall activity of planning and conducting resolution activities, including the distribution of responsibilities and tasks between the Single Resolution Board and the BNB after our country joins the Banking Union. With regard to the expected effects on the economy and the business, the BNB Governor highlighted that it was positive to reaffirm Bulgaria’s strategic course, and that the process is already being filled with content and specific timeframe. The whole process stands as a positive counterbalance against the more general uncertainty from the global and European economic environment. 1/2  BIS central bankers' speeches  Among the more direct positive effects from this first stage on the path to the euro area is the anticipated improvement of the country’s credit rating, as announced by the credit agencies, should the process run successfully in the short-term. That would improve the funding conditions in the country. At the same time, the effects of joining ERM II will not be tangible in regard to the macroeconomic policy and neither will our monetary regime change.