In terms of the migration to e-payments, the insurance and takaful sector is a key sector where the usage of cheques is still prevalent. In 2016, 2.3 million cheques were issued by insurance and takaful companies while 9.8 million cheques were collected by such companies from their customers. While good progress has been made this year with the decline in cheque collection accelerating from -0.5% in 2016 to -22.1% in the first 7 months of 2017, more effective and creative measures are needed to drive cheque usage to negligible levels. To this end, Bank Negara Malaysia has recently concluded a consultation exercise with the industry on the implementation of an ePayment Incentive Fund Framework (ePIF). Under the framework, insurance companies shall set aside RM3 for every cheque issued and RM1 for every cheque collected to be used as incentives to encourage their customers, agents, service providers and government agencies to migrate to e-payments. The current practice where agents collect premiums from customers in cash and make payment to insurance and takaful companies using the agencies’ own cheques or credit cards should stop. The industry should promote greater prudence and transparency in the collection of customer premiums by facilitating customers to make direct payments to the insurance and takaful companies. To this end, the industry equipping agents with mobile point-of-sale (mPOS) or mobile apps to collect payment directly from customers should be the norm. Thirdly, the industry needs to collaborate and invest in key market infrastructure and arrangements.
2/4  BIS central bankers' speeches  In addition to clearing, the extended use of electronic platforms also contributes to the resilience of the European repo market. As mentioned in the last ICMA survey, the segment of the electronic repo trading (via bilateral trading) in particular has benefited from the turmoil observed during H1 2020 because of the dash for cash situation. Nonetheless, support that voice-brokers can punctually bring to clients has been also an important factor during these difficult times. 2. Some points of attention going forward The resilience of the sovereign debt markets during the crisis and their contribution to the absorption of the economic and financial shocks we had to face, should not hide however a few attention point that their development has contributed to intensify or bring back to the forefront, from a financial stability perspective. I would like to highlight two of them, margin calls and the sovereign-bank-corporate nexus. a) European sovereign debt is of course used as collateral to obtain liquidity on the repo market. Episodes of volatility in times of crisis, like during the March 2020 market turmoil, or idiosyncratic events, such as the Gamestop or Archegos ones, can result in significantly increased cash needs, in particular stemming from margin calls across centrally cleared and non-centrally cleared markets. The resilience of the repo market, meaning its liquidity and depth, is thus critical in responding to those margin calls, including for the non-bank financial sector.