samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
The “crypto winter” caused by the crashes of Terra-Luna followed by Celsius Network, by no means signifies that cryptos are over; it’s more of a weeding-out process. The share of stablecoins that are, in principle, backed by mechanisms to stabilise their value has risen fivefold in 20 months. Ensuring a lasting future for stablecoins – which is a legitimate goal – means remaining vigilant with regard to the associated risks. Because, in reality, the name covers a wide range of different forms: -  “crypto-backed” stablecoins, where the word “stablecoin” is a misnomer  as the coins are backed by other crypto-assets; or algorithmic stablecoins, a category to which Luna belonged; -  stablecoins backed by a basket of assets held in reserve, for example  commodities or monetary assets, such as money market funds and commercial paper; in reality these are similar to investment tools and should be treated as such; -  last, stablecoins backed by bank deposits denominated in a single  currency, which are designed to be used as global payment instruments. Page 4 of 5 Regardless of what form they take, stablecoins are, at this stage and in the majority of cases, denominated in dollars and have been developed outside Europe. Their widescale use within Europe would therefore pose a dual challenge, for our strategic autonomy and for our monetary stability; indeed this is one of the reasons why the Eurosystem has launched an investigation phase on a retail digital euro.

If existing players and Fintechs did not both know how to innovate, and often innovate together, it’s the Bigtechs that would ultimately reap the rewards. 2. Promote the integration of Fintechs into the regulatory framework In response to these transformations, our role as public authorities is twofold: to continue to safeguard financial stability and therefore trust, but also to act as a catalyst for innovation – two roles that are far more complementary than they are contradictory. Financial stability without innovation would be a form of dying conservatism; innovation without trust would be a fleeting fad. We therefore want, clearly, concretely and firmly, to facilitate the entry of new players into the regulated arena. To this end, at the end of last year, we adopted the Fintech Charter,iv and today we want to update you on how we have lived up to our commitments. -  Between January and August, the ACPR’s Fintech-Innovation Unit  received 107 contact requests from new project initiators. In 90% of cases, a first response was given within two weeks, with an average response time of six days.
Yet while, as I have already said, much progress has been made in improving the resolution toolkit, the Banco de España needs to continue to be equipped with instruments to enable the performance of its supervisory tasks to be quick and simple rather than complicated and slow. For this purpose it would be desirable to transfer a significant part of the powers of the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Competitiveness in relation to sanctioning, licensing, etc., to the Banco de España, in line with what the IMF has been suggesting for some time. Also, the FROB needs to be authorised to assume the powers of the shareholders in general meeting in relation to banks taken under official administration and legal requirements that delay asset and liability transfers need to be eliminated. As for the Banco de España, it should equip itself with supervisory instruments to ensure that problems can be promptly corrected and it should distance itself from a legalistic system that envisages official administration only as the very last resort, when all legal requirements have been violated. Also, although the Banco de España’s professional and collegiate decision-making structure – one of its valuable traditions – must be maintained, it needs to be documented further and made more systematic, and the information that has begun to be supplied on the Banco de España’s website needs to be expanded.

While the merit of what has been achieved should be accorded to many, allow me briefly to acknowledge the work of the staff of the Banco de España, and most specifically the body of bank examiners, economists, lawyers and the senior managers of the supervisory, regulatory and legal arms of the Bank, on whom the greatest burden has fallen in terms of implementing the strategy approved in legislation. The fact is, the task discharged by them has perforce been complex and time-consuming. The decision by the authorities – previous and present alike – to use limited public funds in the reconstruction of the banking system was warranted because the big Spanish banks did not and do not need help and because, given the delicate situation of our country’s public finances then and now, the impact on the markets of a sharp and sudden increase in the budget deficit might have led to the collapse or intervention of the entire Spanish economy, as indeed occurred in some other countries. But with this strategy of minimising the use of public resources, the restructuring work increases exponentially and extends over time. The Spanish supervisor has had no “bad bank” with which to restructure the sector. Here we have not seen a State which, armed with taxpayers’ money, has bought bad assets from banks, thereby resolving all supervised banks’ problems at a stroke. Our Bank’s supervisory team has had to apply a strategy which has obliged it to seek predominantly private solutions.
Although inflation remains still quite high at around 20%, broad money growth has shown signs of moderating. Debt levels are also now below the average for emerging market economies. Perhaps above all else, it is encouraging that the authorities have not rested on their laurels, but have instead sought to take advantage of this recent more favourable economic environment to increase the momentum of reform. The overall macroeconomic prospect, therefore, is a positive one. The Third Five-Year Development Plan represents an ambitious step forward. It maps out a realistic sequence for a balanced liberalisation of Iran’s economy. The aim of increasing growth to 6% per annum, from an average of 2.5% between 1997 and 2000, should generate employment opportunities for the growing labour force and help to raise living standards. The plan aims to promote growth through privatisation and liberalisation, and to enhance stability by further encouraging diversification of the economy. Macroeconomic policies under the plan are aimed at fiscal consolidation to help reduce inflation, broadening the tax base (including the introduction of VAT), and unifying exchange rates at a market-determined level. Exchange controls will be further loosened. And it is planned that 1  BIS Review 83/2000  price distortions due to state subsidies will also decline. These are ambitious and wide-ranging plans and the key is now implementation. The climate for business investment in Iran has steadily improved over the past decade, in particular following the election of President Khatami in 1997, as the process of liberalisation has accelerated.

There is no doubt that the updated recommendations will enhance the level and methods of protection of the economic system against such type of crimes threatening it. In conclusion, I would like to express my thanks and gratitude for your respected group for its achievements accomplished during its short life, wishing you continued success. I thank the organizers for their efforts. I also welcome you again in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and I hope that your meetings in this session will be a success. 2  BIS central bankers’ speeches
Specifically, we have said that we do not expect to reduce the stock of QE either through outright sales or by ceasing reinvestment of principal until Bank Rate has reached a level from which it can be materially cut. Choosing to focus this part of the tightening cycle solely on Bank Rate will at the margin imply a faster increase than would have been the case were we to combine it with a tightening via a reduction in the stock of QE as well. This will be more likely to give us the ability to respond to an adverse shock using Bank Rate rather than tools which are inherently less flexible and with which we are less familiar. Based on past experience, the MPC currently judges that the level of Bank Rate which would provide room for a material reduction is around 2%. As Chart 4 shows, 67 of the 106 loosening cycles since the Bank was founded in 1694 were achieved by reducing Bank Rate by 2 percentage points or less. You could argue that there is a case for choosing a level higher than “around 2%”. To do so, however, would extend the horizon over which we would be expected to reach that level, and by implication extend the horizon over which the stock of QE would be held on behalf of the MPC. Given the gradual pace at which the equilibrium rate may rise, such an extension could be very long.

1 The second reason why it is reasonable for Bank Rate not to have increased already is that the relationship between the real economy and inflation has not been as one would have expected: Chart 2 shows that while most real variables – such as unemployment – are at or beyond levels at which Bank Rate had been raised in the past, most nominal variables – such as wage growth and inflation – are below. For example, despite unemployment declining by three percentage points from its peak in 2008, headline inflation has fallen by five percentage points over the same period to a record low of –0.1%. This is the inverse of what one would have expected based simply on the historical negative correlation between inflation and unemployment. 2 Of course much of this weakness in inflation is due to movements in commodity prices and the exchange rate. Since 2008 we have learned more about how movements in the exchange rate, in particular, affect inflation. Contrary to the body of literature developed during the period of Great Stability, changes in the exchange rate do have a large and persistent effect on inflation through their effect on import prices.
The results of the testing over the first year suggest that the operations have been successful working with IOER to establish a floor for the level of money market rates. Our analysis has found that, offered at a spread of 20 basis points to the IOER rate, ON RRPs have kept overnight repo rates above where they would otherwise have been, in part by influencing the bargaining power of our counterparties. All of the Desk’s eligible RRP counterparty types participate in the operations, with money funds accounting for the largest share of take-up. Take-up generally increases when the spread between market rates and the ON RRP offered rate narrows. Take-up also rises substantially around quarter- and year-end financial reporting dates, when some money market participants’ access to other overnight investments is more limited. To further examine how ON RRPs might best be structured to supplement IOER in controlling the fed funds rate while limiting the potential for unintended effects in financial markets, the FOMC recently directed the Desk to make several changes to the design of its ON RRP operations.

The nineties, in fact, saw many governments implementing pension reform initiatives, generally based on the three-pillar approach advocated by the World Bank. Under this approach, individuals may have up to three different sources of revenue during retirement, namely a basic state pension, the balance accumulated in a mandatory pension account and voluntary saving arrangements. A number of international studies show that the replacement of pay-as-you-go pension regimes by funded systems provides more incentives for private saving, and reduces the scope for tax evasion by linking contributions paid into the system directly to the benefits received. This contributes to increased investment and augments the productive base, thereby facilitating the financing of social security expenditure commitments. Apart from specific reforms in the social security system itself, an improvement in the fiscal position would have an overall positive macroeconomic effect, compensating in part for the addition in aggregate demand brought about by ageing. The lower absorption of resources by the State could also lead to a higher average level of productivity and to an improvement in the country’s balance of payments. Productive capacity would also be enhanced if the State creates fiscal and other incentives for individuals to provide for their own needs after retirement, leading to an increase in the household saving rate and, consequently, also to a faster accumulation of capital. Fiscal consolidation will, however, only solve part of the problems created by population ageing. The negative supply shock caused by this phenomenon must also be countered by a positive shock.
For households with debts, the scope for consumption is also affected by interest rate adjustments if the share of income used for interest payment changes. Accordingly, we take this into consideration when we make our inflation assessment. There has been a swift increase in household debt and house prices over a long period. One potential cause of concern, which we cannot disregard, is that if this trend continues at the same rapid rate, a situation could develop where, at a later date, there is a risk of a considerable slowdown in growth and employment as a result of households finding themselves compelled to increase savings owing to a heavy debt burden. The risks involved here are very difficult to quantify in forecasts or pinpoint in time, but could none the less be a threat to macroeconomic stability. Inflation could then also revert to a state that might prove difficult to deal with. However, it should be underlined that the likelihood of such a scenario arising is regarded as slight, in particular when we have identified it in good time. We have taken these factors into consideration even if they have not been crucial for our monetary policy decisions. The Riksbank does not have a target for the krona exchange rate. However, since the exchange rate is one of many factors affecting growth and inflation, we must naturally take the path of the krona into consideration in the inflation assessment. The exchange rate affects inflation directly and generally relatively quickly through prices of imported goods and services.

New information made available since our January meeting appear to confirm this. According to the National Institute of Economic Research's most recent Business Tendency Survey, the level of economic activity continued to improve in the fourth quarter of 2005 and firms were very optimistic about the future. Household expectations have also become more optimistic about their own finances and the Swedish economy. In the light of these developments, it seems reasonable to adjust the GDP forecasts for 2005 and 2006 upwards slightly compared with our expectations in December. The situation in the Swedish labour market appeared to be somewhat brighter in January and the number of those employed increased slightly more than expected. However, the trend for the number of hours worked was surprisingly weak and productivity growth in the business sector was therefore stronger than expected. There is no apparent reason to make any substantial change to that assessment either. The labour market is improving although domestic cost pressures are expected to remain subdued. Overall, this means that inflation is expected to approach the target during the forecast period, more or less as we said in December. Given the strong growth in demand, we envisage a relatively moderate increase in inflation. However, it is important to bear in mind that the inflation assessment in December was based on the assumption that a gradual increase of the repo rate would be initiated at the beginning of 2006. In January, we also decided to raise the key rate.
Britain has now experienced 41 successive quarters of positive economic growth. And unemployment in this country is lower than in any other G7 country. This greater stability is no accident. It is the product of a commitment to price stability as reflected in an institutional design encompassing a clear inflation target and a transparent and accountable process for reaching decisions on interest rates embodied in the Monetary Policy Committee. At the beginning of my lecture I referred to the frescoes of Good and Bad Government by Lorenzetti. If today you go to the Palazzo Pubblico in Siena to see these wonderful paintings in the Sala della Pace, which I translate as the Room of Stability, you will see the results of allowing daylight to fall on the walls. Yes, greater transparency - more daylight - has damaged the paintings. But if you look carefully, you will see that whereas daylight has caused no harm to the paintings of Good Government, it has indeed damaged Bad Government on the opposite wall. Even today, Lorenzetti’s frescoes tell us about the benefits of transparency and the importance of careful institutional design. Five years ago I delivered, again in this room, a lecture on the inflation target five years on. I argued that the new requirement on the Governor to write an open letter to the Chancellor whenever inflation deviated from target by more than one percentage point would provide ample opportunity for the Bank to restore the lost art of letter-writing. No letter has so far been required.

To illustrate the quality change and the new product bias, imagine that we go shopping in Harrods both today and in 1910. Suppose that we are given £ to spend - the same amount in both years. In 1910 you could have bought a vacuum cleaner, a record player, an iron, a camera, and a telephone. The vacuum cleaner would have spread as much dust as it removed, the record player would have been hand-cranked and the iron would need to be filled with coal. The camera would have been bulky and awkward to set up, and the telephone would have been largely silent because so few people owned one. Today you can buy a similar bundle of goods for the same total outlay, but all would be of vastly superior quality. So for durable goods it is not clear that the cost of living has increased at all. But if we buy food, however, the results are very different. Unlike appliances, many of the food items in 1910 are unchanged today - McVitie’s digestive biscuits, Quaker oats, Rose’s Lime Juice, Bournville cocoa, Frank Cooper’s Oxford marmalade, Marmite, Heinz baked beans and Colman’s mustard are only some of the familiar items for which precise comparisons over the years are possible. In 1910 you could have fed yourself on 10p a day by eating Marmite on Hovis toast for breakfast; eggs, bacon and toast for lunch; Heinz beans on toast for dinner; with a pint of milk to drink.
The Swiss franc only weakened again recently with the prospect of a COVID-19 vaccine and hopes of a faster recovery of the global economy. On a trade-weighted basis, the Swiss franc is almost 1.5% stronger in nominal terms than at the end of June (cf. chart 3). It thus remains highly valued. As reported in our interim results, we carried out foreign exchange market interventions totalling CHF 90 billion in the first half of this year. On a trade-weighted basis, the Swiss franc has strengthened some 5% in real terms since the beginning of 2020. Had we not intervened, the franc would have appreciated significantly more, and this would have placed an additional burden on our economy in an already exceptionally challenging environment. Page 2/5  Zurich, 17 December 2020 Andréa M. Maechler  News conference  Final sprint in transition to SARON  Let me now say a few words about the changeover from Swiss franc Libor to SARON. The end of Swiss franc Libor is fast approaching. In November, the Libor administrator launched a consultation procedure on the discontinuation of Swiss franc Libor as per end-2021. Market participants in Switzerland may therefore only have around 12 months to complete the necessary work for a smooth transition to SARON. Only the heavily used tenors of US Libor are expected to be granted an extension until mid-2023. However, this will not affect the Swiss franc Libor I have been focusing on in my remarks.

Moreover, market participants interpreted the Fed’s revision of its monetary policy strategy as an indication that the Fed will continue pursuing an expansionary monetary policy for an extended period. This, along with expectations of a major fiscal stimulus package, supported investor risk sentiment and caused inflation expectations in the US to rise. What is more, in Europe, the agreement reached in July on the creation of an EU recovery fund led to a further decline in risk premia on sovereign bonds. Page 1/5  Zurich, 17 December 2020 Andréa M. Maechler  News conference  Overall, risk markets were able to benefit for considerable periods of time, despite the volatile market environment. There was some divergence between the US and Europe, however: While the leading US equity index, the S&P500, hit a new record high as early as the beginning of September driven by technology stocks, price developments on the major European stock markets were more moderate. Thanks to the rally in November, all major indices are up on mid-year. According to the latest reading, Switzerland’s SMI is up around 3% (cf. chart 1). On the interest rate markets, yields on long-term government bonds continued to reflect expectations of an ongoing low interest rate environment. Although yields on US Treasuries did trend upwards slightly overall in the second half of the year, 10-year US Treasuries continued to trade at historically low levels – around 0.9% according to the latest figures – following the marked drop in interest rates at the beginning of the year.