The world's biggest central banks may be on the verge of securing the holy grail of monetary policy: an economic soft landing, despite the sharpest interest rate hikes in decades, the head of a central bank umbrella group said on Monday. Nearly all central banks increased interest rates at break-neck pace to combat a post-pandemic inflation surge, raising fears they would crash economic growth, destroy jobs and push up unemployment along the way. "Economic activity has remained surprisingly resilient, bolstering confidence that economies might be posed for a soft – or at least soft-ish – landing scenario," Agustín Carstens, the General Manager of the Bank for International Settlements said in a speech in Basel.