Transcript of a Press Conference by International Monetary Fund Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn with John Lipsky, First Deputy Managing Director, and Caroline Atkinson, Director, External Relations

January 14, 2010

With John Lipsky, First Deputy Managing Director, and
Caroline Atkinson, Director, External Relations
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Washington, DC
Webcast of the press conference Webcast

MS. ATKINSON: Good morning. Welcome everybody to this press conference with the Managing Director of the IMF, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, and First Deputy Managing Director John Lipsky. This is on the record and we will also be for the first time welcoming journalists to submit questions through the Online Media Briefing Center, So sometimes I'll be taking questions from there. The Managing Director will begin with some opening remarks.

MR. STRAUSS-KAHN: Good morning to all of you. I would like to start with wishing you a Happy New Year, and before answering your questions as Caroline just said, I'll offer some introductory remarks beginning with the devastating tragedy in Haiti. As all of you, we have been very much shocked and saddened by what is happening, and on behalf of the IMF, the staff, the management, the Board, I'd like to offer my deepest sympathy to the victims of this tragedy. At the same time we're looking since yesterday at all possibilities to help Haiti and we will provide $100 million very quickly to the island through our Extended Credit Facility. It needs Board approval, and it's going to be done very rapidly of course in coordination with other agencies. But later on probably we will need to think of something bigger, not only from the IMF but from the international community, to rebuild the island. It's incredible to see how this part of the world is under dramatic circumstances periodically and so I think that we cannot have a piecemeal approach, so we'll probably need to think of something bigger in the future. Just on this point let me say it again in French for the French-speaking people in Haiti. (French)

Let me come back now to a few words first on the economic outlook.

The headline is: It's stronger but fragile. Stronger because the forecast we're going to release in a few days will show that the recovery goes faster than expected, which is good news, significantly, but still it's fragile because in many parts of the world this recovery is still supported by public spending and the private demand is still rather weak. Of course, one interesting point of this recovery is that it goes at different speeds in various regions. In emerging market economies especially in Asia, things are going rather well and Asian countries are in the lead. In advanced economies the recovery is more sluggish depending in these countries on a lot of government support, and that's why it's very important in our view that policies of support should be maintained until there are clear signs that a sustainable recovery appears on the private side. So global recovery is one thing, country by country you have a part coming from the private sector and another part coming from public support, and, of course, until you have private demand strong enough, you can't say that a sustainable recovery really took place. So the question is a very well-known question of exiting from the stimulus measures which have been implemented, and we are very careful not to do it too late because doing it too late will be costly in terms of debt sustainability and will create constraints for the future, but not to do it too soon being just fooled by the fact that the growth figures are not that bad and when those growth figurers are not really based on the recovery in the private sector we are not out of the woods.

Moreover, we are still in the midst of a big jobs crisis and the worst is possibly yet to come. In the U.S. and in Europe the unemployment rate has reached something which is close or even sometimes over 10 percent, and it could rise even higher. In other parts of the world, unemployment rates are also high, maybe not that high but also high, and we all have to keep in mind that this job crisis is not only an economic problem, of course it is, but it's also a social problem in a lot of countries and that tests the effectiveness of social safety nets which have been implemented in many countries. So again because this job crisis is going to last for months depending on the countries and depending on the part of the world we're considering, we cannot say that the crisis is totally behind us, it is far from that. In our view, governments have to take this seriously, which means shifting part of the stimulus toward supporting employment. Some are already planning to do so. Others have the stimulus in place as they designed it a year ago, and our advice would be to try to transfer some of the resources already decided to be spent in 2010 toward different ways to boost employment.

Let me turn to a few words on the policy priorities for 2010. For us, probably for everybody, 2008 was a year of humility. Our confidence in markets and institutions and the status quo turned out to be kind of complacency. We learned in 2008 how fallible, fragile and interconnected we are. After that, 2009 has been a year of unity and the world pulled together to respond to a profound economic and potentially human calamity, and doing that redeemed the promise of international cooperation. Now we're in 2010, and 2010 for us has to be the year of transformation. What does that mean? It means that we must complete the global project to address the failings in regulation, economic policy and governance that lay behind this crisis. It's a lot to do. It starts certainly with the financial sector, and in the financial sector the lessons of the crisis are clear, regulation and supervision have to be stronger. But not only stronger, they have to be smarter. The question is not to add layers of regulation one over the other one, but to have regulations which really help to avoid crises of this kind.

Of course, we are facing two problems. The first one is the political momentum, which is needed to implement these kinds of changes in regulation and supervision, may be vanishing slowly as the crisis disappears. The political will was very strong six months ago and it's today still strong. I hope that in six months from now governments and policymakers will not forget the roots of the crisis, and there's a risk.

The second problem is that on the other side, the financial sector itself is going back to business as usual and that's certainly not what we expect them to do. So from both sides, policymakers and the financial sector, there is a risk that the lessons of the crisis will not be totally drawn and in our view it's absolutely necessary, I'm not saying it will be enough to avoid any kind of crisis in the future, if we want to have a safer and a stronger financial sector even if it's a smaller financial sector to draw all the lessons of this crisis.

One of the points with the financial sector, which is very much discussed these days, has to do with the cost of the crisis. Of course, the idea that we support here and in many other places is that we must move away from a system that privatizes the gains and socializes the losses. As you know, the G-20 has asked us to provide for April a study on a different way to deal with this problem especially looking at different ways to build contributions from the financial sector. We're working on that. Since the beginning we haven't ruled out any possible solution. We're working on all possible solutions. We're working in a very open way discussing with government and discussing with civil society organizations. A lot has been said during this last decade on this question, and all this knowledge, proposals, and criticism which have been proposed also have to be taken together and try to find out what could really be done, what is effective, what is possible to implement. From this point of view I'm very happy to see that for this point at least political will is still there, and as you know, the U.S. for instance is about to make some interesting to make some interesting proposals and I think that's very good news. Many in the world have said when the G-20 asked us to work on this that it's just one study on top of other studies and nothing will happen because you need to do something effective, you need international coordination and you will never get it, and especially the U.S. will never make a step forward in this direction. So that's proved to be wrong, and obviously the main and most important government in the world, one of the G-20, is still ready and that's very good news to go forward in this direction. Our paper will be ready in April taking into account the different proposals by the different governments and other parts of society and we will try to propose something which will be in our view the most effective.

Another challenge for us for April is the other decision by the G-20, which is to look at new sources of growth and to look at it in a coordinated way, that's the so-called Mutual Assessment Framework, which has been set up in Pittsburgh in September. It’s a work in progress which has been accepted at this time and now this process is underway. We are collecting the data. We are going to see how the data provided by different governments matches together, make some simulation, provide some policy advice and all these new kinds of assessments of the global economy, which is in our view absolutely necessary because the way we worked in the past dealing from the IMF at the center bilaterally with the different countries has to go on, it's very important but it's not enough, and we absolutely need something which takes into account the inter-linkages in the global economy and this will be the MAF, the Mutual Assessment Framework. The first run will be for the finance ministers in April and then for the leaders in June.

What are our priorities? Our priorities of course are that we will strive to work with our members to deliver the economic regeneration that will drive growth in the new decade. Let me focus very rapidly on four issues and then I will be done. First, the question of sustainable recovery, of output, of employment, that's our highest priority. We will provide all kinds of real-time analysis that is needed to see this project through as I said before, guarding against too early or too late a reversal of the stimulus measures. The second priority is to continue our efforts to provide the kind of financing that is needed to tackle this kind of modern crisis and we have already had a lot of important evolution in the toolkit. We have to finance different countries that are having problems and we will go on trying to improve these financing tools.

The third thing is that past crises have catalyzed major initiatives and reforms and we cannot lose the opportunity of this crisis to do the same at the global level. That's what we're going to do in working on the mandate of the IMF which was more focused on systemic not only country-level risks. There are different ways to look at it. But obviously the mandate of the IMF and what we are really doing today is much broader than what was the case 20 years ago or 30 years ago, and so it's the right time to take the opportunity of this crisis, what we did in the crisis, what we did well, what we did badly, what we could have done better, to reconsider the mandate of the institution. The fourth priority for us of course is to have a fair voice and share at the IMF and probably in other global institutions but let's talk about the IMF, is key to our legitimacy and effectiveness. I think everybody understands that if we as I just did underscore the importance of having mutual assessment, cooperative work, attempts to understand the global economy and not only different economies one after the other one, and at the same time we need to have everybody feeling comfortable in the IMF which is not only a question of quotas and share, but it's partly the problem. So we will meet the end-of-year deadline because you remember that we're supposed to provide this before January 2011, which means that we have now one year in front of us to deal with this and deliver a fair redistribution of the Fund's quotas. Let me just remind you that we did already a first step in 2008 with a shift of 2.7 percent of the quota. We are asking to do twice as big, 5 percent. All together it will be more than 7.5, it will be a 7.7 shift and that's a really big shift when it will be done. I think that the representation of different countries in the IMF will be really what everybody may expect. Of course, that's not the only governance reform, we will have other governance reforms, but this is probably the most emblematic and the one you guys and the people interested in what's going on in the IMF are looking for.

The last words are on climate change. I want to underscore this issue, which of course is of eminent importance to the long-term welfare of all of us. It's a complex subject and we will have only a limited role in this. But I do believe that this limited role can be of some importance because whatever the solutions, whatever the problems in having coordination in this arena, and the Copenhagen conference has shown how difficult it is, behind all this we have a huge problem of financing and there is no solution to the problem. Whatever solution you choose may avoid the question of financing. So I do believe that the large amounts of resources which are needed to meet this challenge have to be analyzed, proposals have to be made on how we can finance this, and I think that we will be able to provide some ideas in this field in the near future.

The last point was that I want just to mention an additional initiative which is related to our growing engagement in Asia, so I'm pleased to announce that the government of the Republic of Korea and the IMF are planning to jointly host a high-level international conference in Seoul during July 12 and 13 of this year. This will be a high-level conference with many leading policymakers in Asia, and not only in Asia, with of course the idea of looking at the new economic dynamism of this part of the world and also the evolving role of Asia in policymaking and the evolving role of Asia in participating in the decisions made at the global level. Of course, at the same time it will also provide the IMF a good opportunity to deepen our engagement with Asia and let's say to renew our engagement with Asia. We will have more briefings on this in the coming months, but now the dates have been set up and I thought it was a good opportunity to tell you.

That's it. Thank you very much. John and I will be very happy to take all your questions.

MS. ATKINSON: Thanks very much. If you could identify yourselves and your news organizations.

QUESTION: I have a question about the exit strategy. You just said that countries should implement the exit strategy very carefully, but in the past several weeks we have seen many countries beginning implementing exit strategies. What are your comments? Could you elaborate a little bit about China's economic policies and China's challenges? The second, but a very short question, can we say that the global financial crisis is over? If not, when will it be? Thank you.

MR. STRAUSS-KAHN: Let me start with the second question. You can't expect me to tell you what day at what hour the crisis will be over, not only of course it's a joke, but also because we, I mean the countries entered into the crisis almost all together starting in the U.S. but very rapidly, almost all the countries in the world have been concerned, but that is not true for the exit. The exit will happen at different moments in different parts of the world and certainly in Asia we are very close to this exit from the crisis which is not the case in other parts of the world. That's why I said a few words in my introductory remarks on this multi-speed recovery because the recovery will not take place at the same speed and at the same time in different parts of the world. So it's impossible to answer your question if the question is when the last country will get out of the crisis. It's probably far away, but the problem is not the last country, the problem is the global economy and as I told you we do believe here that we see the end of the tunnel, but it's still fragile and that in our view it won't be reasonable to say that the crisis is over before the unemployment question will be solved, meaning coming back to unemployment rates which will not be zero but will be unemployment rate we contemplated before the crisis and we are rather far from this.

Let me say a few words but only a few words on your first question because we would need hours to discuss this. What has been done by most countries including China to tackle the crisis was done very effectively and went in the right direction. We have been arguing here at the IMF for rather a long period that the right strategy, in our view, for China was to shift the growth model from an export-led growth model to a more domestic growth model, which is exactly what happened during the crisis and is still going on. And I’m very pleased to see that the Chinese authorities are still working in this direction, trying to have -- I won’t say to shift from zero to one, it’s not going that way, but at least to transfer a part of the growth, the sources of growth to domestic growth and rather than, as it was the case until now, only from exports.

Of course, this is difficult. It’s not going to happen overnight. That creates a lot of tension and that’s a very difficult move, especially in such a big economy and a big country like China. But what it’s doing there, in our view, is it goes exactly in the right direction. And, of course, we are ready as always to discuss with the Chinese authorities. I was myself in Beijing not so far away, a few weeks ago, discussing how it can be done, what kind of risk we may expect, and how, in our view, this risk can be addressed.

MS. ATKINSON: Okay. Thank you very much. Back on the left there and then I’m going to take one from online.

QUESTION: I have a question on quotas and voting rights.

It’s very difficult for the public to see how much you are making progress on these issues. And I’d like to know where you are on the Pittsburgh commitments and if you think you will be able to meet the target of raising quotas as much as you want.

MR. STRAUSS-KAHN: Yeah, you’re absolutely right. It’s a very technical thing and very difficult to see for the people what’s going on. Moreover, changes are slight changes, small changes. What is as big a reality appears in figures as small figures. And it’s very difficult if you’re not an expert to understand that the shift by 0.2 or 0.3 percent can have a huge signification. So I totally agree with you. We will try to make it understandable, but it’s not that easy.

Directly to your question, we’re working on that. It’s both a technical and a political problem because the only thing anybody can understand clearly is that the total has to add up to 100. And so increasing the share of some means decreasing the share of others. And I see many other countries have their share increasing, but I don’t see so many agreeing to have their share decreasing. So it’s, I would say, a technical, but it’s also a diplomatic process.

I have no doubt that when it will be time, namely at the end of this year, the move will be done. No doubt.

MS. ATKINSON: Thanks very much. I’m going to take a question from online. She asks do you have any comment on the possible U.S. bank levy to recoup the costs of the bailouts? And is that an appropriate approach?

MR. STRAUSS-KAHN: Well, I already made a comment. I really celebrate this proposal by the U.S. Government because it shows that, as I said before, the political momentum to move in this direction is still there. It’s a very interesting proposal. I’m not going to be comment now because I don’t have the detail of the proposal. But I think that it’s a very good signal which is given by the U.S. to the rest of the world and it’s very significant, and that the part of the world where many commentators say you will have nothing done in the U.S. because Wall Street is too strong. The banking sector, the financial institutions are too strong, so nothing will be done. It’s the first part of the world where a real proposal is made. So this is a big contribution to the work we are doing and, of course, we will have to make some comments, but later on when the details will be known.

QUESTION: Thank you. My question obviously is about my region of the world.

I’d like to have your thoughts on what you see as prospects for Russia and her neighbors, and specifically on Ukraine. Because we all know that the IMF has had some issues with going on with the program with Ukraine. Is there a way of continuing supporting them throughout their political difficulties which may end soon or may not?

Thank you.

MR. STRAUSS-KAHN: So I understand when you say “my region of the world” that you feel that Russia and Ukraine belong to the same European region. Well, it’s not a secret that the program in Ukraine has run very well until three months ago. And then -- which could have been expected because of political constraints and the election coming -- the situation has been a bit more difficult. So we are working very closely with the Ukrainians. We worked with them during all the month of December and John Lipsky did fantastic work trying to put all the different parts of the Ukrainian government executive power working together. It’s not that easy, but I guess it won’t be easy in other countries with this kind of election and this kind of institution. So at the end of the day, we succeeded in having all the payment, especially the international payment. And then they made the gas payment to Russia being done, the situation is quiet even if there are some pressures on the economy.

Elections are going to happen in coming days and the second run at the end of the first week of February. We’re expecting that this will go smoothly. And then, of course, with a new executive power we are expecting that normal relations can start again. There is no reason why the different commitments which have been made by the different candidates, which are in some ways converging -- everybody’s saying that we want to go on with the IMF program -- that this commitment will not be fulfilled. And so I’m confident that as soon as this normally shaky electoral period will be over, it will be possible to resume a normal relationship with the program.

QUESTION: You just mentioned the IMF’s growing engagement in Asia. Could you please elaborate a bit more on China’s role in this effort?

Thank you.

MR. STRAUSS-KAHN: On China’s role in Asia or on China’s role in our engagement in Asia?

Well, China is becoming one of the most important economies in the world, and I think it will be correctly reflected in the quota business we were just talking about a few minutes ago. So, of course, the role of China in the Asian economy is huge. And as we want to renew our relationship with Asia, it has to go through different countries, different cultures, but, of course, the role of China is a major role.

Maybe you remember that when I was a candidate to this position two years ago I made a trip around the world to meet the different governments and to ask them if they would support my candidacy. And in Asia, I started with China. And I started with China because I have myself a long relationship with the Chinese authorities and I do believe that the cooperation, clear, frank cooperation between the IMF and China, is key for both. Key certainly for the IMF because, as I said, of the importance of China in the global economy, but also key for China, which is a country, in my view, that deserves today to play its role, total role, in the global economy.

And, of course, having a big role in the global economy because of the figures, because of the reality, implies also to have big responsibility for the future of the global economy. And to work on this question, I think that the Chinese authorities understand, and they told me that working with the IMF is a nice way to do it. So our engagement or re-engagement with Asia is not only with China, but, of course, China’s part of it is a big part.

MS. ATKINSON: Okay. Thanks very much. I’m going to take a question online.

The question is, 2010 may be the year when the dollar loses its role as the world’s reserve currency because of the U.S. economic problems. How likely is that? And are you examining the idea of a new currency based on Special Drawing Rights?

MR. STRAUSS-KAHN: Well, I don’t want to repeat myself and tell you the same story at each press conference. (Laughter) But same question, same answers.

Many would have expected before the crisis that with such a crisis originating in the United States, such a downturn in the U.S. economy, then the effect on the dollar will be huge and the dollar will fall very rapidly. It didn’t happen. It didn’t happen and some may argue on the contrary.

So what does that mean? It means probably that for many, many people and (inaudible) households, corporations in the world, the dollar remains, especially in difficult times, the best, maybe not the only, but the best way to have safe savings.

So what’s going to happen in 2010? Problems everywhere? Recovery arriving, including in the U.S.? Certainly in the U.S., not as fast as in Asia, for instance, but, nevertheless, still in the U.S. And I don’t see that it will have a huge effect on the role of the dollar. You’re not asking any forecasts in terms of the exchange rate, and if you ask me, I won’t give you any. But in terms of the role of the dollar in the global economy, I don’t see the role of the dollar in the global economy changing rapidly in the direction of a smaller role. It does not mean that over time, in the coming decades, the role of other currencies, including the euro, but not only the euro, cannot be bigger and that we cannot go in the long future to a more multi-currency system rather than the system we have today, which is basically, if not totally, a single currency international currency system.

In this system, where a different currency will be seen as a reserve currency, will the SDRs be able to play a role? Well, it’s a very difficult question on a technical basis. In principle, I will think I wish it. It was also one of the ideas of the founders of the IMF that after a while an international currency not directly linked to a sovereign could be used. This was 65 years ago. It didn’t happen in 65 years; maybe it will happen before the next 65 years, but certainly not during the next 65 weeks.

QUESTION: (Off mike.)

MR. STRAUSS-KAHN: I’m afraid people can’t hear you.

QUESTION: Icelanders were expecting that the review of the economic plan between Iceland, the government, and IMF would happen this week. Is it being delayed and why? And does the veto of the Icelandic president of the I-Save law have anything to do with a possible delay?

Thank you.

MR. STRAUSS-KAHN: Since the beginning, the IMF has tried to help Iceland to tackle a very difficult crisis and especially the Icelandic people to deal with something which happened without they were even aware of the risks. And I can understand the (inaudible) Icelandic citizen when they say that all this is totally unfair, that what the bank did was probably wrong, but why does this hit them directly. I can absolutely understand that.

On the other hand, there are some international obligations for a country, and they have themselves to understand that Iceland as a sovereign country cannot be immune from what has been done by its financial sector. So our role in the IMF is to try to help Iceland to get through this very difficult situation, and I think we succeed. I know that in Iceland many people are criticizing the IMF. We’re used to this. Just fair. We are trying to help Iceland to avoid any kind of economic catastrophe and, so far we succeed with the help, of course, of the Icelandic government.

Now, there is this question of I-Save. Contrarily to what has been said by many, for us the solution of this banking question is not a condition for the IMF to help the country. But we are an institution led by the international community, which means that we need to go forward to have a majority of this international community wanting to go forward. If a lot of members think that we have to hold on, we have to hold on. What I hope is that the decision made by the president will be sold rapidly and so that we can resume our work with the government.

In a nutshell, we are at the disposal of the Icelandic government to do what is the most helpful for them and for the Icelandic people. We are not tax collectors for any country. But on the other hand, we need to have the support. And you, Icelandic citizen, you need to have the support of the international community to be able to go forward. So we have to find a solution to solve all those problems and that’s what we are working on, I think in the best possible cooperation between the IMF and the government.

QUESTION: I would like to know if you have a specific concern for the recovery in Europe and specifically after the data yesterday of the GDP in Germany, -5 percent in 2009, and for the employment sector. How do you see the recovery in 2010?

MR. STRAUSS-KAHN: Well, as I said, in advanced economies the recovery will be more sluggish than in the rest of the world, and this is true especially for Europe. The picture is that the European countries had a smaller downturn than the rest of the world because the economy’s more rigid, so it resisted more to the downturn. And the other way around, in the recovery they’re less flexible and it will be more difficult to go back to potential growth. But that’s true for almost all European countries and that’s why we have a concern, as you say, about growth.

But in the figures that we’re going to release in the coming days, even in Europe those figures are much better than the one we had before. So the recent figures you were just mentioning are quarterly figures. Some quarter may be better; some quarter may be worse. In the medium term and at least for the year coming we see growth being rather reasonable in Germany as in other European countries.

Nevertheless, Europe and especially Central Europe, but not only Central Europe, is always the part of the world which has been the most hit by the crisis. We have a lot of programs in Central Europe. And everybody knows the concern about other countries in Europe. So we cannot say that the situation is totally safe in Europe and that there’s no problem looking forward, but I think the governments, central banks are addressing this problem very correctly. And so I do not expect -- as I said, I do not expect huge growth in the next year, but I do not expect real problems.

QUESTION: Thank you.

I was watching the video and then there was one point that I’m really interested in being able to find out. That’s why I rushed here just now. Thank you very much for giving me the last question opportunity.

So can you -- can Mr. Strauss-Kahn explain more about the mandate change that you are thinking about? Because we do notice, you know, the mission of IMF has changed over the years. And people in -- the scholars and former officials are now discussing that IMF should try to redefine itself for this new century as we’re working out of this crisis, as we’re building a new economic system. Can you elaborate what kind of new IMF you are trying to build onto the new system?

Thanks.

MR. STRAUSS-KAHN: Yeah. I can elaborate, but I won’t elaborate too much.

There’s two main directions. One is that when the IMF has been set up, the main concern about global stability had to do with balance of payment problems. And so the idea was to build an institution which will be likely to provide economic stability through addressing this problem of balance of payment. It appears clearly that in the modern economy this concern remains, but there are other concerns. And economic stability and financial stability can be hit by something which, at the beginning at least and maybe all over the crisis, has little to do with balance of payment problems. And this crisis shows this clearly.

I think that the IMF did this work, the work it has to do during this crisis, which goes far beyond the question of balance of payment stability. For some countries it was a problem; for other countries it wasn’t. So we have to take this into account and revisit our mandate. It doesn’t mean that we need to change the articles of agreement; many of them are correct. It’s just the way we look at them. And the way we look, the IMF has to work in the 21st century. So that’s one big direction.

Questions are more complicated than they were 65 years ago. Financial stability is not only a question of currency. And so we have, during this crisis, addressed a major bigger problem than only currency problems. This has to be taken into account in our mandate.

The other side is that it’s clear I think for everybody today that economic stability, financial stability has also a lot to do with social tension and democracy and stability of democracy in many countries and at the end of the process, as I often say, even the question of peace between countries. Because economic stability and financial instability -- economic instability and financial instability, how often in history have led to war, civil war or international war?

So we have to take into account in our policy advice to give advice (inaudible) good economics, but also good politics, taking into account the need of the country, the most vulnerable in the country, the way a country can get out of problems not only basically on a sheet of paper; not taking into account that the people are made of blood and flesh, but also the fact that that’s a human being and that you cannot change the reality of the economy without taking into account the history, the political circumstances, and the social tension in the country. So that’s also a different way to address the problem.

And I think that during this crisis, we have been rewarded. Many of our programs went rather well or are going rather well just because we were more able than in the past to take into account this different (inaudible). So that’s two different directions in which our mandate has to be broadened.

In our view, or at least the way we read it, we understand our mandate has to be reconstituted, the broadening the scope from BOP problems to the global financial and economic instability problem on one hand, taking into account more than economic and financial question to solve or to provide this global public good, which is financial stability. So that’s at least two directions in which we have to move.

MS. ATKINSON: Thank you very much. That’s the end, as I said. And just to remind you that the Haiti press release, we have copies in the room and it’s also been posted online. Thank you.

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