Keynote speech by Frank Elderson, Member of the Executive Board of the ECB and Vice-Chair of the Supervisory Board of the ECB, at the conference on “The decade of sustainable finance: half-time evaluation” organised by S&D and QED

Brussels, 14 November 2023

Just over a month ago, Kenyan athlete Kelvin Kiptum completed the Chicago marathon in a stunning two hours and thirty-five seconds – a new official world record. Halfway through the course, however, it wasn’t at all clear that Kiptum was on track to set this record. He was lagging behind the previous record set by his compatriot Eliud Kipchoge in Berlin in 2022. But by completing the second half of his marathon almost a full minute faster than the first half – achieving what is known in running as a negative split – he managed to break the world record by 34 seconds and get closer to the elusive two-hour mark than anyone had done previously in an official race.^[1]

As a number, “two” seems to have a particular…