Mojmír Hampl: A digital currency useful for central banks? Speech by Mr Mojmír Hampl, Vice Governor of the Czech National Bank, at the 7th BBVA Seminar for Public Sector Investors and Issuers, Bilbao, 27 February 2018. * * * Ladies and gentlemen, Let me begin by thanking BBVA for their kind invitation to this event. It is a pleasure to speak in front of this knowledgeable and receptive audience, and it is a pleasure for me in particular to be in Bilbao for the first time in my life. Cryptocurrencies, digital currencies, and especially bitcoin have become almost household names over the last couple of months. What is especially interesting and curious for this place – as some of you might know – is that among the hundreds of cryptocurrencies introduced in the last couple of years is one called “bilur”, which means “chain” in Euskara, the Basque language. Bilur is unique for being the first cryptocurrency explicitly linked to the price of oil. By the way, the second part of the label “cryptocurrency”, namely the currency part, is a misnomer in my eyes. No existing cryptocurrency for the time being conforms to the three basic functions of money: a store of value, a unit of account, and a medium of exchange. One cannot store value in an asset that can get 30%–50% cheaper or more expensive in a matter of days.
Ravi Menon: Reforms in banking regulation – effects and outcomes Keynote address by Mr Ravi Menon, Managing Director of the Monetary Authority of Singapore, at the Symposium on Asian Banking and Finance, San Francisco, 11 July 2016. *  *  *  Mr John Williams, President of the Federal Reserve Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, good morning. Bank  of  San  Francisco  Let me, on behalf of the Monetary Authority of Singapore, express our appreciation to John and his colleagues at the San Francisco Fed. •  It has been a fruitful collaboration on this Symposium. •  We had a good meeting in Singapore last year, and my colleagues and I are very pleased to be here in San Francisco for this year’s Symposium. There has been no lack of excitement for global financial markets over the past year: •  the US Federal Reserve Bank’s deliberations whether to raise interest rates;  •  China’s transition to a more market-based exchange rate amidst a slowdown in economic growth; and more recently  •  the decision by UK voters to leave the European Union. But even as banking stocks have taken a pounding – forgive the pun – the global banking system has generally held up well. There are no doubt fragilities in some European banks, but as yet no disorderly failure or contagion. I think this has at least something to do with the regulatory reforms put in place since the financial crisis.