Svein Gjedrem: Hearing before the Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs Introduction by Mr Svein Gjedrem, Governor of Norges Bank (Central Bank of Norway), at a public hearing before the Storting's Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs, together with Mrs Kristin Halvorsen, Minister of Finance, and Mr Bjørn Skogstad Aamo, Director General of The Financial Supervisory Authority of Norway, Oslo, 13 February 2009. *  *  *  Government finance fund and government bond fund The crisis in the banking sector was initially a problem of liquidity. In October and November, there was considerable turbulence and fear was spreading among banks. Credit premiums were high. The situation has improved. The improvement is to a considerable extent the result of action taken by the authorities. The swap arrangement whereby banks can exchange covered bonds for government paper has been important. The arrangement is oriented towards larger banks, and a number of banks have made use of this facility, in an amount so far totalling more than NOK 70 billion. Norges Bank has proposed an extension of the arrangement to provide banks with funding at 5-year maturities. Maturities so far have been up to 3 years. The extension is important to ensure that maturity dates do not all fall within a short period. The arrangement provides banks with Treasury bills. Banks have used these as collateral for loans, sold them or kept them as liquidity reserves. There has been high demand for Treasury bills.
John Gieve: Economic prospects and the policy challenge Speech by Sir John Gieve, Deputy Governor of the Bank of England, at the Cityco Breakfast Meeting, Manchester, 16 January 2009. *  *  *  Introduction One of the things that strikes me most on coming back to Manchester is the pace at which the fabric of the city changes – and I was looking at this yesterday from up on the 23rd floor. It’s not much more than two years since I was last here but in that time the city centre has added about half a million square feet of retail space, more than 1½ million sq ft of new office space and nearly 8000 extra hotel beds (a 40% increase). All this development reflects the attractiveness of Manchester as a location for inward investment and even more importantly the strong growth in businesses indigenous to the city, many of which are represented today. But while I gather that nearly a million square feet of office space has been let again in 2008 it is clear that in Manchester, as elsewhere, the past year has been increasingly challenging for businesses of all types and the prospect is forbidding. The severity and nature of the challenges we face particularly in the banking sector makes it very difficult to predict where we will be in a year from now. And the pace of change means that it is even more true today than usual that we cannot rely for navigation on official statistics alone.