6  BIS Review 17/1997  -4-  American banks and IBM to form Integrion Financial Network, LLC.7 Integrion itself has announced that it will not provide electronic or home banking services, but will instead design and operate a secure electronic gateway or interface system linking bank customers to their depository institutions, including links via the Internet.8 Finally, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and the Board of Governors are currently processing an application from a foreign bank, with a United States securities brokerage subsidiary, to acquire a software firm planning to design software for customers of brokerage firms to place securities buy-and-sell orders over the Internet.9 The OCC, meanwhile, confirmed in correspondence in August of 1996 that, in addition to providing home banking services to its customers through the Internet, a national bank subsidiary could also provide Internet access to customers and nonbank customers in the bank’s service area.10 In the midst of all this supervisory “support,” however, I should also mention some of the as-yet unsettled issues dealing with the unique regulatory burdens facing depository institutions offering financial services over the Internet. Among the most difficult will be the proper application of the Community Reinvestment Act (“CRA”), a United States statute that requires depository institutions to meet the credit needs of the communities where they accept deposits. What exactly is a deposit community in cyberspace? Nobody really knows.
The objective to be achieved is the same, that is, to build the regional capacity to be better positioned to prevent, contain and resolve any potential crisis at minimum costs to our financial systems and to our economies. In conclusion, the cumulative effect of the changes since the Asian crisis has transformed ASEAN – opening up new opportunities and making the region resilient and a dynamic centre of growth. The ASEAN “tigers” are back, and poised to leap on to the next wave of economic advancement and prosperity. BIS Review 46/2007  3