Bank of Italy

Palace Koch Headquarter of the Bank of Italy,
Via Nazionale Rome

Banca d'Italia (Italian for Bank of Italy) is the central bank of Italy and part of the European System of Central Banks. It is located in Palazzo Koch, Roma, via Nazionale. The bank's current governor is Mario Draghi, who took the office on 16 January 2006.
After the charge of monetary and exchange rate policies was shifted in 1998 to the European Central Bank, within the European institutional framework, the bank implements the decisions, issues euro banknotes and withdraws and destroys worn pieces.
The main function has thus become banking and financial supervision. The objective is to ensure the stability and efficiency of the system and compliance to rules and regulations; the bank pursues it through secondary legislation, controls and cooperation with governmental authorities.
Following reform in 2005, which was prompted by takeover scandals, the bank has lost exclusive antitrust authority in the credit sector, which is now shared with Italy's Antitrust Authority.
Other functions include, market supervision, oversight of the payment system and provision of settlement services, State treasury service, Central Credit Register, economic analysis and institutional consultancy.
Bank of Italy gold reserves are 2,451.8 tonnes (2006)