In the medium term, the Bank of Albania will focus its efforts on a number of initiatives, notably on further legal developments and infrastructure improvements. An important step in the medium term is the drafting of the bill “On the payment account". The bill will transpose the European Union Directive “On the Payments Account” and promote transparency by creating a public register to present all commissions applied by institutions, which can be easily compared. At the same time, during this period, the Bank of Albania will engage in a number of infrastructure developments that support financial inclusion, reduce the costs of using these instruments and is estimated to have an impact on the remittance market, mainly from the point of view of remittance receivers and their use. Here we can mention the creation of a national platform for processing payments in real time (instant payment and processing of card payments). The platform creates conditions for the development of innovative and low-cost services and also aims at market segments that create ample volumes by targeting state institution payments as well as daily payments that Albanian citizens make. Last but not least, I would like to thank the Government of Albania for the importance it places on this matter and its continuous support. In particular, I would like to thank the ministries such as the Ministry of Diaspora and the Ministry of Finance and Economy for their support and fruitful cooperation.
To ensure smooth operation of the New Turkish Lira money markets and to contain the potential volatility in short term interest rates, the Monetary Policy Committee, judging that inflation will display a more rapid fall than envisaged before, has lowered the borrowing rates by 50 basis points and the lending rate by 100 basis points on November 19, 2008. This allowed the margin between the lending and borrowing rates to be reduced by a further 50 basis points. BIS Review 153/2008  1  We are also aware of the significance of foreign exchange liquidity in the banking system and progressively put into effect necessary measures in order to get through this period with minimal damage. To that end, we have resumed our role to act as an intermediary in the FX deposit market as of 9 October 2008, and later doubled the transaction limits to 10.8 billion USD. During times of confidence breakdowns among the participants of the financial markets, central banks can serve as a blind broker to intermediate in the foreign currency lending market. In this FX deposit market, banks can post their bids for foreign exchange without disclosing their identities. It also acts as a market of last resort as the banks can borrow directly from the Central Bank.