The President of the European Central Bank is in Moscow for a biennial meeting with his counterpart at the Bank of Russia in Moscow.
Jean-Claude Trichet's talks with Bank of Russia Chairman, Sergey Ignatiev, focused on transparency and banking supervision. “It is not because they are Russian banks. They could be U.S. or Chinese banks, but because they are Euro area banks, their current activity is in the Euro area and are therefore eligible for our refinancing operations. We are not a closed shop ourselves. We are a vast continental economy of 320 million fellow citizens, which has the order of magnitude, if I may, of the U.S. economy itself and we are open,” Mr Trichet said.