by rules of the game that would be coded once and for all and for which respect would be entrusted to algorithms, even if they are encapsulated in “smart contracts"... Will the forces pushing towards decentralised finance make unbalanced relationships disappear? As well as failing governance mechanisms, the concentration of operational risks, and cyber attacks? In my opinion, the answer is no: trusted third parties, central banks and supervisors are not about to disappear... Secondly, and this is a corollary of my first point, confidence requires maintaining central bank money as the anchor of the financial system. Finally, confidence requires a regulatory framework that is clear, fair (“same business, same risk, same rule”) and balanced, i.e. capable of both encouraging innovation and maintaining the stability of our financial system. The search for this balance implies that regulators and supervisors be involved in innovation issues alongside the innovative players. I will come back to this. Once the principle of confidence has been established, central bankers and supervisors must also be able to distinguish between what changes quickly and what changes more slowly in the sector they supervise. First of all, the health of French fintechs should not mask the importance of another piece of good news: the “traditional” banking world is resilient and useful. It showed its robustness during the two major crises that have occurred since the beginning of the century.
As an example, I would like to mention the work carried out by the ACPR with representatives of digital asset service providers (DASPs) on theapplication of  anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing (AML/CFT) rules to the cryptoasset sector. As you have understood from these examples, at the Banque de France and the ACPRwe cannot envisage taking action without interacting with the innovative financial ecosystem that you largely represent. 3. This brings me to my last point: what are the challenges that we must not miss collectively? I would particularly like to emphasize here the issues related to the regulatory framework for the transformation of the financial system. The digital finance strategy published by the European Commission is already a year old and the roadmap includes many useful and structuring projects for the future. Already, the discussions on the MICA (crypto-assets) and DORA (operational resilience) projects illustrate the need to reconcile professionals’ knowledge and operational realities  with the general risk control objectives in order to achieve the balance between innovation and financial stability that I mentioned earlier. From my point of view as a supervisor, progress still needs to be made on these texts to reconcile the necessary pragmatism and the necessary flexibility that the search for this balance implies with the requirement for risk control and the prevention of regulatory arbitrage. However, the projects that will be launched in the future are no less crucial.