Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 July 2025
This chapter wraps up the arguments and delineates possible avenues ahead for central banks. Central banks may become Banks of the State, financing government deficits as they have done recently. This may imply a retreat from central bank independence. With large holdings of public securities in central bank balance sheets, the pressure to finance governments would increase. Another option is for central banks to change their job profile, becoming Banks for Everybody. This would happen if they decided to issue all-purpose retail central bank digital currencies. This would risk weakening private initiative in the payment industry, a sector where private markets have worked well recently. The third avenue is for central banks to remain Banks of the Banks, the dominant model that prevailed until the Great Financial Crisis of 2008–09. Central banks would continue to exert rigorous surveillance and use their regulatory powers to encourage further progress and foster efficiency and stability in the underlying settlement infrastructures. We express support for this line but also highlight some challenges, first and foremost the regulation of crypto assets and the extension of safety nets and central bank competence on “shadow banking,” the growing unregulated segment of financial markets.
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