The third challenge is that we are currently living with genuine uncertainty. Who could have imagined in autumn 2019 that spring 2020 would turn out the way it did? * I would like to thank Mårten Löf, who has helped me with this speech. Moreover, I have received valuable comments from Charlotta Edler, Mattias Erlandsson, Rebecka Hallerby, Peter Kaplan and Marianne Sterner. 1 [6]  Monetary policy has pushed down market rates During the spring, the Riksbank has decided on a number of monetary policy measures. When financial markets do not function as normal, the credit supply in the economy is threatened. Here, I wish to highlight four measures that the Riksbank has implemented.1 The first has concerned buying government bonds, mortgage bonds and municipal bonds, as well as commercial paper for a total of SEK 300 billion. The Riksbank has, secondly, decide to give the banks the opportunity to borrow from the Riksbank so they can in turn offer loans to companies, SEK 500 billion has been allocated for this purpose. The third measure gives the banks the opportunity to borrow an unlimited amount from the Riksbank. And the fourth measure is the Riksbank's decision to lend up to 60 billion US dollars to banks that need foreign currency. These measures have two effects. They facilitate credit supply as the Riksbank in this way supplies more money to the financial system. When the volume of money increases, there is also downward pressure on market rates.
Replacing missing prices in this way is usually referred to as imputation. The total weight in the CPI for the products where prices are imputed in this way is not particularly large; it amounts to just under 3 per cent of the total weight of the CPI, see Figure 2. The percentage of imputed prices is at present much higher in other parts of Europe. Figure 2 shows the aggregate weight for the product groups where imputation has been necessary in total for the euro area and the larger euro-area countries. The statistics refer to the harmonised index for consumer prices, the HICP.3  2  See the press release and the material presented at an extraordinary meeting in the Consumer Price Index Board on 1 April. 3 The HICP was developed by Eurostat, which is the EU’s statistical body. The measure was designed to facilitate international comparisons of inflation. 3 [6]  Figure 2. Percentage of imputations in the HICP 4 Per cent  Source: Eurostat  What do the many imputations abroad entail for the quality of the statistics? The conclusion in a current working report written by two world-leading researchers in this field is that the principles recommended by international organisations lead to underestimation of the rate of inflation and overestimation of the real increase in consumption.5 However, this is probably no major problem for Sweden, as the percentage of prices imputed is relatively low. The problems could be much greater for other countries, and therefore for international comparisons.