Using financial accounts: A central banking perspective

Abstract

The development of financial accounts is high on the global policy agenda. These accounts have become an essential element of the SNA, drawing from the traditional description of real economic aggregates augmented to present information on financial flows and positions. Several steps have been taken in recent years to refine important aspects of this framework, with the goal of building “integrated sectoral financial accounts”. To this end, two areas of focus are important. One relates to collecting the statistics to “fill” standard economic accounts. Large data collections have been undertaken since the 2007–09 Great Financial Crisis to build better-quality, more comprehensive and flexible data sets. A second important issue is to highlight how these statistics can be useful and support public policy. These areas are of particular relevance for central banks. As producers, they have been highly involved in the statistical exercises launched to address the challenges highlighted by the 2007-09 crisis. As data users, they have an increasing demand for information in order to understand, and act on, the financial system in pursuing monetary and financial stability policy objectives; financial accounts represent a key opportunity to address these information needs.