samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
The employment ratio for females has increased dramatically across a selection of OECD countries over the past four decades. Data on ethnicity are harder to obtain, but there have been improvements in employment rates among foreign-born residents in many countries over the past 15 years. Numbers of women and ethnic minorities in senior positions have also increased. The Davies Review recently found that the UK has now reached its target of 25% female board representation among FTSE-100 companies, having doubled in less than 5 years. 58 Although progress has been made, there are a number of areas where we still fall short. In the UK, the employment rate for those with Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) backgrounds is still materially lower than for the population at large. 59 Women still only account for a third of employment in higher managerial roles in the UK. Although the pay gap has fallen, average pay for men in the UK remains almost 20% higher than for women. 60 And male CEOs across European public companies earn on average over 30% more than their female equivalents. 61 The Bank has itself made good progress over recent years. For example, we currently have 43% female representation across the organisation and we are working towards a 50/50 gender split by 2020. At senior management levels, 27% are women with a target to boost this number further. If we rewind 10 years, the equivalent figure would have been only 7%.

Writing back in 1848, John Stuart Mill captured well the societal benefits of diversity: 15 “It is hardly possible to overrate the value, in the present low state of human improvement, of placing human beings in contact with persons dissimilar to themselves, and with modes of thought and action unlike those with which they are familiar…Such communication has always been, and is peculiarly in the present age, one of the primary sources of progress” More recently, Scott Page (2011) has encapsulated the positive social externality of diversity more formally. Economists love an equation, so here is one: Collective Ability = Individual Ability + Diversity Recent evidence, drawn from a range of disciplines and settings, has tended to confirm Mill and Page’s conjectures. Diversity generates a positive social externality, helping the collective far exceed the sum of its individual parts. Diversity is synergy. This has been found at almost every scale of social grouping, from small communities and organisations, to large economies and nation states. The benefits have been found, too, in non-social settings, such as ecological and logistical systems. 16 One channel through which diversity may improve societal outcomes is by fostering innovation and creativity. If different raw ingredients are added to the intellectual melting pot, the final dish is likely to be richer and more innovative. 17 Psychologists believe that divergent thinking is the cradle of creativity. That is why creativity is often found to be greatest among very young children whose thinking is unconstrained by convention.
In another case, the employees of a bank that reported a suspicious transaction, were called and probed in the prosecutor office as being those the persons of actually being involved in ML. The reporting subjects and the institutions that implement the law, must define among each other certain procedures that would eliminate the occurrence of such case and that ensure the protection of confidentiality of the persons that have filed the suspicious reports. As long as this element is not totally ensured, any other discussion on the matter risks being a purely theoretical one, without much practical values. In conclusion, as a Governor, I must say that I would encourage a better cooperation among the institutions that are subject or that implement the law on AML. At the same time, Bank of Albania as the supervisory institution of its licensees will promote a stronger contribution by banks in Anti Money Laundering requirements implementation. In exerting our function, we shall not be limited to the verification of the existence and the functioning of the internal structures and procedures, but will deepen further on assessing the support the management structures of the banks, give to the real implementation of the AML internal policies. The position of a central bank is, according to the law, very comfortable, but playing the proactive role of a responsible central bank, showing the concrete implementation of this responsibility, we will intensify our efforts together with the other actors of interest to enable a better implementation of the law on money laundering prevention.

Although annual inflation may rise during the second quarter of 2011 amid very low base effects from food inflation, inflation is expected to fall gradually in subsequent periods to stabilize at around 5 percent by early 2012. I think analyzing the forecasts by comparing the latest data with the previous Report period would help to better understand the changes in forecasts. As I have mentioned earlier, we revised our output gap estimates slightly downwards compared to the April Inflation Report, owing to the anticipated impacts of the problems in the euro area on aggregate demand (Figure 34). However, there is no significant revision in the pace of the recovery, as the downward revision in the monetary policy stance is expected to partially compensate for the adverse impact of weaker external demand. In this respect, we based our assumptions on an outlook, in which there would not be a remarkable change in the pace of the recovery in economic activity. Accordingly, there has been no significant revision in the inflation forecasts for 2011 and onwards (Figure 34). BIS Review 133/2010  15  Any new data or information regarding the inflation outlook may lead to a change in the monetary policy stance. Therefore, I would like to underline once more that the assumptions regarding the future policy rates underlying the inflation forecast should not be perceived as a commitment on behalf of the CBT. 4.
Norman T L Chan: Three questions on the nature and management of risk Keynote speech by Mr Norman T L Chan, Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, at the Hong Kong Monetary Authority-Global Association of Risk Professionals (GARP) Global Risk Forum Opening Dinner, Hong Kong, 28 May 2013. *  *  *  Richard (Apostolik), Ladies and Gentlemen, 1. It is my great pleasure to welcome you all to this dinner gathering tonight. I would like to take this opportunity to thank GARP for co-hosting tomorrow’s Global Risk Forum with the Hong Kong Monetary Authority. 2. This is the third in a series of joint fora which GARP have organised with regulators, and follows similar events in New York and London, focusing on risk and risk management from a global perspective in the wake of the Global Financial Crisis. 3. In contrast to the two previous host cities, Hong Kong (and indeed Asia more generally) has been fortunate not to have borne the full brunt of the recent Crisis. But, we have had our own fair share of crises in the past and, speaking as someone who was tasked with tackling aspects of the Asian Financial Crisis in somewhat unconventional ways, I can assure you that we are only “all too well aware” of the severe economic and social disruptions that financial crises can and do cause.

The Basel Committee has done a great deal in upgrading capital and liquidity rules. Under the direction of G20, there is long list of other regulatory reforms, including those dealing with the moral hazard problem arising from “too big to fail” and the risks observed in the OTC derivative markets. Some national authorities have introduced, or plan to introduce, measures that would separate core retail and commercial banking from  BIS central bankers’ speeches  3  investment banking. Although, as I have said, very few people would dispute the need for urgent reforms, there are differences in views on whether the reforms that are underway are indeed adequate or entirely appropriate. 16. I hope that, at tomorrow’s Forum, you will have the opportunity to discuss these and other pertinent issues as we continue seeking to re-evaluate both the nature of risk management and the role of regulation and supervision in the wake of the Global Financial Crisis. Once again let me welcome you all and wish you Bon Appétit! 4  BIS central bankers’ speeches
2  BIS Review 103/2009  One important element of the ECB’s actions has been the non-standard measures I have described as “enhanced credit support”. 1 This support collectively defines the special and primarily bank-based measures to enhance the flow of credit over and above what could be achieved through policy interest rate reductions alone, and avoid a systemic liquidity threat. As you know, the ECB’s enhanced credit support comprises five elements: •  the full allotment of banks’ demands for central bank liquidity at fixed rates;  •  the further expansion of the list of assets accepted as collateral in our operations;  •  the lengthening of the maturity of our operations that now go up to one year;  •  the provision of liquidity in foreign currencies, notably US dollars; and  •  finally, direct purchases of covered bank bonds in order to revive this market segment, which is important in Europe. Let me briefly recall the rationale underlying these five specific measures. The first motivation for introducing enhanced credit support was to address the seizing up of the money market. If left unaddressed, this seizing up would have rendered the refinancing of many bank assets impossible, risking a massive and disorderly deleveraging by credit institutions. This, in turn, would have seriously hampered the monetary policy transmission mechanism and ultimately curtailed the expansion of credit to firms and households in the euro area. The core of the measures that we introduced in October was the “fixed-rate fullallotment” tender procedure.

At the end of my speech I expressed concerns that the correction of financial imbalances, and the associated re-pricing of risk, might not have run its full course. As we now know, this was indeed the case. Only ten days later, the re-pricing in markets took a quantum leap. In mid-September the turbulence turned into a full-blown crisis. The chart of money market spreads tells this tale clearly. BIS Review 103/2009  1  As you can see, credit spreads soared. Financial market activity fell dramatically, volatility spiked and the global financial system came close to seizing up. Central banks stepped into the breach, addressing this unprecedented market failure. The ECB was in the vanguard of actions to contain these intensified tensions, taking a number of standard and non-standard measures. The measures by the leading central banks eventually paid off. As you see in the chart, money market spreads – a symptom of the market failures that I mentioned – retreated from their peaks. They are now back at levels comparable to those before the intensification of the crisis last year. But they still remain elevated in a longer time perspective. The crisis triggered a freefall in economic activity. The chart shows that within a few months only, from January to July 2009, the projections for 2009 shifted massively to the left, in highly negative territory. After they centred around -1.5% in January 2009 and -3.2% in April 2009, they dropped to -4.5% in July, entirely outside the distribution range still a few months earlier.
I am delighted that tomorrow the first parts of the new Banking Act come into effect and give the Bank of England new powers to resolve failing banks and protect depositors. At the heart of the Act is the creation of a Special Resolution Regime for UK banks and building societies. The FSA will have the power to trigger this regime before an institution becomes insolvent. And once a bank is in the regime, the Bank will have the powers to arrange for it to be wound up , drawing on a new bank-specific insolvency-procedure, or to transfer the whole or part of the bank to a commercial purchaser, if necessary via a temporary bridge bank owned by the Bank. If none of these options is sufficient to protect financial stability, there will be the option of temporary public sector ownership. In the course of the legislative process, we have identified and enacted wide ranging protections for netting and set off and creditors generally to ensure that no one is made worse off by the resolution than they would have been if the bank had gone into a simple administration. The Act also puts the Bank’s financial stability objective onto a statutory footing and formalises the Bank’s role in overseeing those payment systems that are essential to the smooth running of the economy.

But that retreat from globalisation would also have a cost in inefficiency and restraints on the flows of capital between countries. We should not forget that the last decade of free financial markets has been a time of great progress across the developing world in Asia, Eastern Europe and South America. But the process of building up national controls is already underway in many countries including even the UK which has long been one of the most open economies for capital and ownership. It will continue unless we can convince each other that much better structures for cooperation and coordination are in place. That is an acute problem within the EU where the single market is based on a common passport. But dealing with the European problem is not the main priority since most of the biggest banks in the world are based elsewhere. I don’t think we should give up on this international agenda. The package of economic measures that were rolled out late last year – from coordinated cuts in interest rates, to provision of dollar liquidity and measures to support banks – showed the power and possibility of coordinated action. The programme of work on the regulatory implications of the crisis which has been coordinated by the FSF and will go in April to the G20 Summit demonstrates a wide accord on the main regulatory issues. But we need more progress on implementation as well as policy.
Under pressure from the market, a number of countries have therefore initiated far reaching multi-year programs, which at least partly address structural problems. Moreover, the way the EU as an institution deals with public finances will change. As many European officials have pointed out, in 2004, it was not Greece or Portugal but Germany – together with France – that undermined fiscal discipline by successfully averting sanctions foreseen under the Stability and Growth Pact. Now, the EU and in particular the big countries are openly advocating measures to amend and significantly strengthen the institutional mechanism in order to enforce fiscal discipline. 5 In this context, the member states of the EU are faced with a fundamental issue. The public debt crisis has shown that interdependence between member states of a monetary union is strong. 6 Going forward in reforming the institutional set up of the EU, the core question is to what degree EU member states are ready to further relinquish sovereignty. How centralised or federal should the EU be? This discussion bears remarkable resemblance to the early years of the United States. At the time, an intense debate took place around the full assumption of the Revolutionary War debt of the states by the national government. The debate pitted the Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton against James Madison and Thomas Jefferson.

Philipp M Hildebrand: Europe’s fiscal challenges Speech by Mr Philipp M Hildebrand, Chairman of the Governing Board of the Swiss National Bank, at the Annual General Meeting of the Swiss-American Chamber of Commerce, Rüschlikon, Switzerland, 21 June 2010. *  *  *  I would like to thank Rita Kobel Rohr for her valuable support in drafting this speech. I also want to thank Matthias Lutz for helpful comments. I want to thank the Swiss American Chamber of Commerce for the kind invitation. It is a privilege to speak to you this evening at your Annual General Meeting. The last time I was with you – it is now nearly two years ago –, I paid homage to Albert Gallatin, the legendary Swiss-American Secretary of the Treasury of the United States at the beginning of the 19th century. On that occasion, I chose to honour Gallatin because I felt he incorporates fundamental values long shared by Swiss and Americans alike. As it turns out, recent developments in Europe and elsewhere demonstrate compellingly that one of the important lessons of Gallatin’s outstanding career remains particularly relevant today. He teaches us that public debt reduction requires unwavering political commitment to fiscal discipline. In my remarks this evening, I will attempt to put the fiscal challenges Europe is currently facing in a broader context. The handling of these challenges by Europe’s governments and its citizens will have implications for Switzerland, but also for the United States and ultimately for the world.
Often in the past in this country we behaved as if we thought that promoting higher growth and employment – which I repeat is, of course, what we all want to see – was largely a matter of pumping up demand. We paid too little attention to the structural, supply-side, constraints. All too often we tried to buy faster growth and higher employment at the expense of just a bit more inflation. But that was like trying to squeeze a quart out of a pint pot. And you all know the result: inflation accelerated, often accompanied by a worsening balance of payments, until it could only be brought back under control – as eventually it had to be brought back under control – by pushing up interest rates dramatically and forcing the economy into recession. We get uptight these days when interest rates rise by ¼%: it was only 14 years ago that we were driven to increase interest rates by 4% in the space of 17 days. I don’t need to remind you – or perhaps I do – of the really miserable social as well as economic consequences, as right across the economy people lost their jobs, their businesses and their homes. But even more insidiously, repeated experience of boom and bust produced a pervasive short-termism in business behaviour, which infected both industry and finance, and both employers and employees, however much we all like to blame everyone else.

The same may undoubtedly be said about the Central Bank. After all, useful and supportive as these institutions may be, they neither can nor should play a leading role. That role can only be performed by the financial companies themselves. Because they rely so heavily on open access to credit markets, it is crucial for them to enjoy the confidence of their creditors. In this respect like many others, credibility is a fragile thing and a very high price can be paid for losing it. Turbulence in global markets is sure to continue. Naturally people try to read the signs and foresee the most important parameters, in order to adapt to them in good time or respond sensibly. Important as it is to keep a close watch on developments and changes in global markets, what matters most of all is to be strong and well-positioned enough to withstand the most unexpected shocks. Global liquidity has been exceptionally abundant in recent years, and has been widely tapped on good terms. The benefits of resourcefulness and bold, quick action can be realised to the full in such circumstances. It is impossible to rule out that such a climate will persist for a long while, but this is by no means certain. And when a change does take place, it may be caused by unexpected circumstances and strike quickly. It is then that caution and prudence prove most effective.
In 2018, an FT survey of banks around the world provided evidence of a cautious approach being taken by firms.5 And according to a McKinsey survey of financial and non-financial firms, most barriers to the more rapid adoption of AI were internal to the firms themselves: poor data accessibility; lack of suitable IMF (2019) ‘Global Financial Stability Report April 2019’ Carney, M., (2019) ‘AI and the Global Economy’ 4 IIF (2018) ‘Machine Learning in Anti-Money Laundering’ 5 FT (2018) ‘AI in banking reality behind the hype’ 2 3  3  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Pages/speeches/default.aspx  3  technology infrastructure; and a lack of trust in the insights of AI, for example.6 Despite the plethora of anecdotal evidence on the adoption of AI/ML, there is little structured evidence about UK financial services. To gather more evidence, the Bank of England and the FCA sent a survey in March to more than 200 firms, including the most significant banks, building societies, insurance companies and financial market infrastructure firms in the UK. This is the first systematic survey of AI/ML adoption in financial services. The survey is focused on building our understanding of key themes. First, the extent to which firms have adopted, or are intending to adopt, AI/ML within their businesses and what they regard as the most promising use cases. Second, the extent to which firms have clearly articulated strategies towards the adoption of AI/ML.

There are three key elements:  1/ A European regulation of stablecoins, as drafted by the European Commission. This socalled “MiCa” has two strengths: its rightly speaks of “Crypto-assets”, and not “Cryptocurrencies” which is a misleading expression. And on substance, the draft requires a strict and dual supervision – by national authorities and EBA – to ensure consumer protection and financial stability in a fair and consistent way within the European single market. 2/ A European acceleration on CBDC, which is not yet a decision, as published by the ECB last Friday. As a principle, central banks need to have an in-depth understanding of innovation and shouldn’t be afraid to “learn by doing”. The Banque de France is now engaging with the innovators from the private sector to conduct a program of 8 experiments on wholesale CBDC. We, the ECB and the Eurosystem, need to be ready to issue a money in digital form in case of need. Let me be clear: we cannot allow ourselves to lag behind on CBDC. That may mean that we create if necessary a retail CBDC, in order to ensure the accessibility of central bank money for the general public, in particular in countries where the use of cash in payments is declining. And it may mean also that we decide to issue a wholesale CBDC, with the aim of improving the functioning of financial markets and institutions. Within the Eurosystem, the ECB has established a high-level task force (HLTF) therefore, and just published its report.