Bundesbank President Nagel on AI Economic Impact at Rome Symposium
Summary
Deutsche Bundesbank President Joachim Nagel delivered a keynote speech at the International Economic Symposium in Rome on April 21, 2026, examining artificial intelligence's economic impact. The speech addresses AI's implications for economic growth, inflation, and financial stability, while also assessing Europe's competitive position in the global AI landscape. The speaker draws historical parallels to early electricity adoption and notes that despite visible AI capabilities across applications, broader macroeconomic effects remain less apparent in aggregate statistics.
What changed
This document is a keynote speech by Deutsche Bundesbank President Joachim Nagel at the International Economic Symposium in Rome, exploring how artificial intelligence may affect economic growth, inflation, and financial stability. The speaker notes that while AI capabilities are already visible across many applications from text generation to forecasting, its broader economic impact remains less apparent from aggregate statistics. Nagel compares AI's potential spread to historical patterns of general-purpose technologies like electricity, suggesting AI could transform the global economy.
For financial institutions and businesses, this speech signals growing central bank attention to AI's macroeconomic implications. While the speech carries no binding compliance obligations, it indicates that regulatory supervisors are actively analyzing AI's effects on financial stability. Organizations developing or deploying AI systems should monitor central bank publications on this topic as regulatory frameworks evolve.
Conference
- Date
- 2026-04-21
- Location
- Rome
Archived snapshot
Apr 22, 2026GovPing captured this document from the original source. If the source has since changed or been removed, this is the text as it existed at that time.
Joachim Nagel: Already here, not yet everywhere - shaping the economic impact of artificial intelligence
Keynote speech by Dr Joachim Nagel, President of the Deutsche Bundesbank, at the International Economic Symposium, Rome, 21 April 2026.
Central bank speech | 21 April 2026 by Joachim Nagel PDF full text (374kb) | 6
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1 Introduction
Ladies and gentlemen,
The science fiction writer William Gibson once said: The future is already here – it is just not very evenly distributed. That remark quite aptly describes the current state of artificial intelligence. Its capabilities are already visible across many applications – from text generation and coding to research and forecasting. Or, in a more personal context, from designing invitation cards to making songs or even movies. Yet its broader economic impact is still far less apparent from the aggregate statistics.
This is not without historical precedent. When electricity first spread throughout the advanced economies, the productivity gains were limited, to begin with. Firms adopted electric motors, but they did not reorganise their production straight away. However, artificial intelligence could be spreading significantly more quickly than earlier general-purpose technologies. This suggests that artificial intelligence is a transformation that will almost certainly have a massive impact on the global economy.
In my speech today, I will explore what AI may imply for growth, inflation and financial stability. Another key question I will address is this: How do we shape its impact? In this context, I would like to touch upon how well Europe is positioned in the global AI race. But before I do that, allow me to outline how I see AI and where I see its strengths and weaknesses.
The views expressed in this speech are those of the speaker and do not necessarily reflect those of the BIS. About the author Joachim Nagel More from this author
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