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by Tiziana Di Giovannandrea

20 March 2021 New technologies mitigate the difficulties of distancing.

The change towards digital caused by the Covid 19 pandemic will also remain beyond the emergency: this was stated by the deputy DG of the Bank of Italy, Alessandra Perrazzelli, speaking in a session of the Milan Digital Week, which is taking place online.



Perrazzelli highlighted how the Bank of Italy has worked with the other institutions: "To recover a future that brings us to normality, since the pandemic represents an experience that has disrupted everyday life, with a degree of pain that will remain . But the country - he stressed - is demonstrating resilience in all sectors and new technologies are able to mitigate the difficulties of continuing to distance itself. The effects of this change are not transitory, however - he argued -. various observers and also as the Bank of Italy we believe will remain even when the emergency is over ".



"Ours is the point of view of a Central Bank and it is possible to clearly detect this acceleration, which has already been underway for some time - he added - which is structurally changing the financial industry, with product and internal process innovation. , through which the relationship with customers is managed and established ".



More electronic payments

"The use of increasingly electronic payments has grown further and is particularly evident with Pos transactions compared to ATM withdrawals and also in the speed with which the use of Contactless has gone from 35% before the pandemic to the current 55% of enabled cards ", he then observed.

Phenomena amplified by start-ups to large global industries, "also bearers of a series of risks that we are carefully evaluating and monitoring", he said, speaking of the need to pay greater attention to the protection of people, inclusion, privacy, cyber threats and uses for illegal purposes.

"We are creating mainstream structures in the bank that can lead to an understanding of these widespread finance phenomena which will be that of tomorrow".



'Milano Hub' at work, soon call

"The hub activity has already started and will start more massively in about a month. The people are in Cordusio, in the historic Bank of Italy headquarters, and we are about to launch the first calls, while later it will be the turn of an international competition ".

On Milano Hub, the Innovation Center of the Bank of Italy, Perrazzelli explained that the hub is the effort to "bring out what the bank has always done. The criteria with which we will identify the calls will be based on the creation of new realities, therefore the exploration of all sectors related to digital finance, including great attention to inclusion and

green finance

and not only to the processes of banks and financial operators, but to what will make the offer better for the citizen. It will be the structuring from a regulatory point of view - he clarified - that is the first part of the real incubator in which the financing also takes place ".

Criteria, he specified, that "will be published shortly, putting the hub at the center of a supply chain that can give the country a distinctive role".



Digital development is fair and

inclusive

In addition, Perrazzelli highlighted how it is "necessary to look to change with confidence but at the same time with the awareness of the commitment necessary to ensure that digital development is sustainable, equitable and inclusive. The Bank of Italy - he added - participates in this effort by exercising all the functions entrusted to it ".