Non-banks in the Payments System: a Central Bank Perspective

As with the other panellists I have been asked to talk about the challenges that non-banks pose for central bank oversight of payment systems. This is an issue that the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) has spent quite a lot of time thinking about recently. As you might be aware, in the late 1990s, the RBA was given specifi c powers by the Australian Parliament to promote the effi ciency and stability of the Australian payments system. In this respect we are a little different to many other central banks in that we have explicit legislated objectives not just in terms of stability, but also in terms of effi ciency and competition. We have also been given formal powers in these areas and a separate board has been created in the RBA to exercise these powers. These arrangements grew out of recommendations of a wide-ranging inquiry into fi nancial regulation in the mid 1990s. Amongst other things, this inquiry drew attention to diffi culties facing nonbanks in participating in the payments system.