Janet Yellen, who’s the Chair of the Federal Reserve, has talked about the headwinds that have been slowing down the U.S. economy. One of those headwinds is exactly what you’re talking about, the fact that people are locked into homes because their homes are either underwater, the value of the homes are less than the value of their mortgages, or because their credit-rating was damaged during the Financial Crisis because people lost their jobs, and so their credit-rating was impaired. And so that’s really the reason why we’ve been so delicate and so slow in actually raising interest rates. It’s partly exactly what you’re talking about. Dr. Olajide Oladipo: Thank you. Audience Member: Good morning. Thank you for being here. One of the things that we’ve been looking at here in Southeast Queens is the establishment of CDFIs, additional CDFIs to support the growth and the access to capital of small businesses. Would you comment a little bit about what do you see as the future of CDFIs going forward in this economic climate, and any suggestions that you would have to support us in doing that? Thank you. 11 / 15  BIS central bankers' speeches  President Dudley: Well, I guess I sort of think of CDFIs as doing God’s work in some ways because the hardest thing for someone with a really good idea and starting a small business is to get that initial bit of capital to establish a track record.
Now it includes 38 of 91 eligible funds inspected by the Bank of Russia. Many funds had to improve the quality of their assets to enter the system. Furthermore, actuarial industry has been launched in compliance with the law; today we have a bit more than 100 actuaries. They are active and it is an important segment of the financial market established last year. We have almost stamped out unscrupulous depositories which provided bogus excerpts on available securities. We implemented our function of a megaregulator which allowed us to make cross-checks and reveal such situations immediately. We took measures under the project “Clean Register”. BIS central bankers’ speeches  3  We have developed and are implementing the road map on electronic communication in the financial market. Electronic communication decreases companies’ costs and ultimately the price of services for consumers, provides adequate financial inclusion to avoid having dependence on actual branches. New digital technologies quickly transform the financial sector. We have established a special technology and innovation task force at the Bank of Russia which is to study technological trends in the field of finance, and to timely reveal the areas requiring regulatory and supervisory changes. We seek to avoid hampering the development of new, more efficient and userfriendly technological solutions, but prevent accumulation of risks capable of mitigating consumer right protection. Last year we established a Centre for Cyber-attack Monitoring and Response in the Financial Sector (FinCERT), which provides, among other things, methodological assistance in ensuring the highest possible cyber-protection to market participants.