samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
Fourth, government authorities may be reluctant to apply stricter requirements to domestic banks, fearing that their competitiveness may weaken. Such a drift in regulation towards a – too low – minimum level is important to avoid. For Norway, it is essential that rules are applied both strictly and equally in the Nordic countries. Allow me to conclude. The world economy is these days in the deepest recession in the post-war period, in spite of the strong use of various measures. Most markets and countries, including Norway, have been hit by the crisis. Norges Bank has set the interest rate at a low level to curb the decline in activity and counteract an excessive fall in inflation. In accordance with its mandate, Norges Bank has given weight to anchoring and strengthening expectations that inflation will be low and stable ahead. This enhances the effectiveness of monetary policy. Thank you for the opportunity to present these opening remarks. BIS Review 60/2009  5  6  BIS Review 60/2009  BIS Review 60/2009  7  8  BIS Review 60/2009  BIS Review 60/2009  9  10  BIS Review 60/2009  BIS Review 60/2009  11  12  BIS Review 60/2009  BIS Review 60/2009  13  14  BIS Review 60/2009  BIS Review 60/2009  15  16  BIS Review 60/2009

This is part of the priorities of the members of the Joint Committee on Climate Change over the next 12 months to pave the way for the adoption of disclosure standards by the industry in the immediate future3. This will not only contribute towards lowering information asymmetry, but will also assist external stakeholders to hold financial institutions to account for their climate risk commitments. Leveraging Malaysia’s value offering – opportunities in sukuk  2/3  BIS central bankers' speeches  The capital market can play a critical role to address the financing gaps not only in green, but social and sustainable sectors. The SRI Roadmap for the Malaysian Capital Market issued in November last year aims to create a facilitative SRI ecosystem and chart the role of the capital market in driving Malaysia’s sustainable development. The sukuk market, which is a high growth segment in Islamic finance, has an important role in supporting the growth of the green technology sector. Malaysia continues to be at the forefront of green sukuk, which is the preferred mode of investment for those that prefer investments with a positive environmental impact. We can certainly tap into the sukuk market to fund activities or technologies that support a low-carbon and climate resilient society. Conclusion I am not asking us to reinvent capitalism at this conference – there is simply not enough time for that if we are to meet our Paris Agreement commitment!
In other words we are trying to maintain overall, macroeconomic, stability in a much broader sense, in the medium- and longer- term and not just the shortterm; and the Government's inflation target is the criterion against which our success, or otherwise, in achieving that broader macro-economic stability is to be measured. Our problem is that we don't know with any great precision or confidence exactly what is happening on the supply-side:- we don't know that's to say precisely what rate of growth we can hope to sustain. We don't know precisely either what is currently happening, or what is likely to happen looking forward over the next couple of years or so, to overall, aggregate, demand. And nor do we know precisely what the full impact of a change in interest rates will be on aggregate demand, or how long it will take before the full impact is felt. Ours is not a precise science. In fact it's more of an art than a science. And, although we bring as much economic and statistical science to bear as we can, we know that our forecasts, and indeed our policy judgements, are subject to a range of error. They can't be accurate to every last digit. So, we can't expect to hit the inflation target all the time, but by consistently aiming to do so we can hope to get reasonably close to the target on average over time.

The frustrating thing is that, with the best will in the world, there was not much that either we at the Bank or the UK Government could have done to ward off the pressures on UK manufacturing, which had their origins abroad. It's fairly obvious where we are talking about the global slowdown - with negative growth last year of about ½ % in Japan and very slow growth of just 1¼ % in the US and 1½% in the Eurozone. We can go to international meetings and encourage the respective authorities there to stimulate their economies, but there is nothing that we can do about it directly ourselves. It's perhaps less obvious that we cannot influence the exchange rate. Many people think that we could weaken sterling against the euro quite simply by cutting our interest rate relative to the interest rate in the eurozone. But it's not as simple as that. The US has reduced its interest rate far more aggressively than the ECB over the past year or so, but the dollar is actually stronger against the euro than it was to begin with; and the same is true, to a lesser degree, of ourselves, here in the UK, with sterling also stronger against the euro (though weaker against the dollar) than it was a year ago. So there was nothing much - as I say - that we could have done directly to affect these depressing effects coming from the global economy and the resulting weakness of external demand on the UK.
After all, there is always a small risk that things can go badly wrong. If one is content to refer to this, one could justify more or less any type of policy. What one must try to make sufficiently credible is the risk that things will go badly wrong is sufficiently large that it needs to be addressed. One must also be able to show that the proposed changes have sufficient effect on the risks in relation to the costs of the measures taken. It is not enough, in my opinion, to express concern for high indebtedness and refer to the financial crisis. One must, as far as possible, make an assessment of households’ entire  12  This alludes to a book on financial crises from an historical perspective by Reinhart and Rogoff (2009), This Time is Different, Princeton University Press. The title of the book is ironic and refers to the fact that immediately prior to each financial crisis there has been a tendency to regard the current situation as special and quite different from previous crises. However, many who refer to the book appear to have missed the fact that monetary policy has a very obscure rule as reason for financial crises there. BIS central bankers’ speeches  5  financial situation, including their balance sheets with both assets and liabilities, as well as their debt-servicing ability, on the basis of the facts and analyses at hand.

The main arguments against a more expansionary policy that have been put forward lately are that this type of policy would be too risky, given the size of household debt.3 Let me therefore use this argument as a starting point for my reasoning. The discussion among the Executive Board members to a large extent reflects a broader international debate on the relationship between monetary policy and financial stability, on whether household debt is too high and, if so, whether monetary policy should be used to try to limit indebtedness – although the Swedish debate does contain a number of specific characteristics. In brief, one can say that those who believe the repo rate should be held extra high appear to think as follows.4 If the interest rate is too low, households take on too much debt. A large share of the loans households take on are used to buy housing, which also pushes up housing prices. If indebtedness and house purchases are based on overly optimistic calculations, there is a risk of a heavy fall in housing prices when the mood changes, for some reason. If prices were to fall, many households would find themselves in a situation where their assets have substantially declined in value, while their debt remains unchanged. They may then want to pay off some of their debt to come down to a more suitable level. This means they will prioritise saving over consumption. Demand in the economy will then decline and unemployment will increase.
Don’t take this debate for disagreement about the broader goal: I am convinced that all FOMC members are committed to taking whatever steps they deem would help advance the dual mandate of price stability and full employment. For my own part, I am deeply unhappy with the current forecast of prolonged high unemployment, and will continue to review whether there is more that we could do that would bring more benefit than cost. Monetary policy must do its part. But there is a strong case for complementary policy actions because such actions can help secure better outcomes than can be achieved through monetary policy alone. If we are to achieve the best possible recovery and build for the future, we will also need ongoing efforts across four broad fronts: financial stability, housing policy, fiscal policy and structural adjustment to foster more sustainable U.S. growth and a more balanced global economy. Ongoing attention to financial stability and the reform and repair of the financial system is essential to support recovery. We need to make sure this proceeds in a manner that is not pro-cyclical, and for this reason we are, for instance, phasing in new capital and liquidity standards, and monitoring how institutions adjust to the new requirements. Nonetheless, the financial system must be healthy to support sustained access to credit. If we want those households and businesses with low levels of debt to reduce precautionary saving, we need to restore their confidence in the financial system.

William C Dudley: Securing the recovery and building for the future Remarks by Mr William C Dudley, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, at the United States Military Academy at West Point, West Point, New York, 17 November 2011. *  *  *  I am honored to have the opportunity to speak to you today in the hallowed halls of West Point. I do not need to tell anyone here of the long and distinguished tradition of this institution and the U.S. Army. I believe that the U.S. military is one of our nation’s greatest institutions and a living demonstration of the best of America. Your example of national service inspires us all to live up to our duty to do all we can to advance the national interest. I am the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, part of the Federal Reserve System that serves as our nation’s central bank. In this capacity I am also vice chairman of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), the Federal Reserve committee that sets interest rates and makes other decisions about monetary policy. This committee sets policy to advance the mandate given to us by Congress: to promote maximum employment and price stability. In the support of these objectives I and my colleagues must also guard as best we can against threats to financial stability, because credit is the lifeblood of the economy.
Of course, risk management should help us reduce the frequency and size of negative events and then recover more quickly and effectively when negative events occur. But, risk management, in my view, should also help the right things happen by giving us tools to work more effectively.2 Innovation is an essential tool to manage risks, because not changing can be riskier than changing. For example, an incredibly powerful risk management activity is to transform a slow, manual process that often fails into a fast, efficient, automated process that can self-correct when there is a problem. Clearly, it is just as important to understand the risk of not doing something as it is to understand the risk of doing something. And, when we understand our risk appetite and our risks, we can comfortably conduct controlled experiments, learn faster, and innovate. We're no longer driving in the dark; we're getting where we want to go with headlights on, and we can stay inside the guardrails and not skid off the road. Second, risk management could be misunderstood as primarily the responsibility of risk management specialists. Actually, effective risk management is a way for everyone in an organization to help things go right. From the economic analysts to the cash processing operators to the software engineers, we can make better plans, decisions, and actions when we are prepared for change and have the capacity to adapt to surprises.

What does that take? Let's reframe the core components of operational risk – people, process, and technology – using a resilience lens.15 People are resilient when they are ready and able to adapt to change by adjusting priorities, replanning, and refocusing activities and resources. Resilient staff work with shared purpose across organizational siloes, operate effectively in environments of uncertainty and ambiguity, and are empowered to develop creative and innovative solutions. Processes are resilient when they are robust to changing internal and external conditions, including issues with suppliers, inputs, processing, outputs, and customers. Resilient processes provide clear signals of their operating state, have the right level of automation, and continue to function under stress. Technology systems are resilient when they are flexible, robust, and able to be recovered rapidly. And then the overall organization is resilient when these three components – people, process, and technology – work together effectively. Resilient processes and technology should support the ability of the staff to successfully manage in normal times and during disruptions. What are some concrete steps to strengthen resilience? In terms of processes, an important first step is to identify the processes that are critical to achieving organizational objectives. Gains are often found through simplification and automation of manual processes, especially when combined with performance metrics and risk metrics that provide real-time measures of process health.16 For technology, modernizing technology and software development processes can be a key area of focus.
What surprised us more on the negative side was the slow transmission of easier financial conditions on current and future inflation. 2  BIS central bankers’ speeches  So what have you learned so far? Our own experience with a negative deposit rate was more favourable than we initially thought. We then went to minus 0.20. Since then we also have the experience of smaller countries which cut the rates to even more negative levels. We also reopened the discussion on the zero lower bound. There is no decision which has been taken but it is true that, given the experience that we have seen, we thought in the Governing Council that there was the case to re-discuss the lower bound. Have you looked at what other central banks have done? Yes but one needs to be very careful when looking at the experience of other countries. Each central bank works in a different environment, what you see in a small open economy is not necessarily applicable in a larger zone. Could the euro area tolerate minus 0.75 percent, like, for example Switzerland? In terms of level, I wouldn’t have any judgement in terms of ‘they can do it so we can do it’, that would be too simplistic. You have to look at the specificities of each one. What’s your thinking on how to avoid the so-called ‘Cliff Effect’ if QE were to come to a sudden end? We are very well aware of that.

That’s the most pessimistic view. I don’t take that view, I think it’s extreme. Indeed, after our communication at the last Governing Council meeting in Malta, you have seen that inflation expectations, five-years-five-years, have recovered – which is not the case for oil prices. It’s not a “normal” recession followed by a “normal” recovery. We have a cyclical recovery, but recently we have additional downside risks to our scenario unfortunately. Is there a point at which the ECB’s assessment of risks to the economy starts to actually erode confidence? We say clearly that we have a cyclical recovery, which is moderate. The investment cycle is quite weak still. We know the recovery is fragile. There are a number of geopolitical issues that weigh on confidence in general. This fragility is a fact of the environment. I think what is different about the recovery is that this is the aftermath of what some have called a balancesheet recession, and that starts to be better understood now. It’s a stock adjustment, there are legacy problems which our societies have big difficulties in addressing. You have still in a number of countries non-performing loans weighing on the balance sheets of a number of financial institutions. We also see that insufficient changes in the way that European institutions function have been weighing on the recovery. What do we still need in terms of European reform? We have gone a big part of the way with the banking union, but there the last miles are very important.
I would like to assure you that depending on the nature of the recommendations, some will be implemented in a short period of time, while others will take more time and additional technical and human resources, and of course, further technical assistance in terms of experience and knowledge of the ECB and the national central banks of the EU. It is the creation of opportunities for further cooperation that I consider the second important benefit for the National Bank from the implementation of this project. Namely, the project involved a number of experts from various areas of central banking from the ECB and from 11 central banks of the European System of Central Banks. In the past nine months they had intensive communication and cooperation with their counterparts in the NBRM and conducted a total of 16 assessment missions within which they unselfishly transferred their whole experience and knowledge. The implementation of the project, further contributed to increasing the awareness and knowledge of the NBRM staff in the relevant EU regulations, standards and practices applied by modern central banks. Hence, I would especially like to emphasize the future prospects of our mutual cooperation that will hopefully continue in the same spirit and will further deepen. Finally, let me once again emphasize my satisfaction and give the credit for the successful implementation of the project, to the resident programme coordinator from the ECB, and to all participating experts from the ECB, the European System of Central Banks and the National Bank of the Republic of Macedonia.

Conclusions Summing up, our results imply that there might be considerable cost savings to be made by the banks through a more transparent and cost-based pricing This is because such a pricing strategy would lead to changes in the pattern of demand. Consumers would have economic incentives to shift to those instruments that are less costly to produce. According to our cost estimates, they would use debit cards more and credit cards and cash less and they would increase their use of electronic credit transfers and direct debits at the cost of paper-based credit transfers. A more cost-based price strategy would result in private customers facing transaction fees on paperbased and electronically-initiated credit transfers and in the introduction of transaction fees for cash withdrawals. Fees for acquiring services would have to decrease. The fact that Swedish banks do not take any fees whatsoever for cash withdrawals, while such fees can be observed in the other Nordic countries, may very well be the explanation for our greater use of cash and lesser use of card payments. Based on the data on variable costs and volumes, the banking sector could lower their variable costs by around 560 million Swedish kronor annually if bank customers replaced charge and credit cards and cash with debit card payments. The shift from paper-based to electronically-initiated credit transfers could result in a further reduction in the banking sector’s variable costs of almost 200 million Swedish kronor annually. One interesting issue to consider is the reason for this pricing strategy.
With my assessment of the GDP gap, the repo rate according to the Taylor rule would instead have been around 6 per cent in the third quarter of 2008, but still considerably higher than the 4.75 per cent it reached before the crisis (see Figure 10). When I look back on the monetary policy conducted since I joined the Riksbank on 1 January 2006 up to the point when the financial crisis hit Sweden in September 2008, I therefore believe that monetary policy was too expansionary in the years preceding the crisis. Inflation increased and reached a level that was tangibly higher than the inflation target, Resource utilisation was higher than normal and there was a rapid expansion of credit. Despite this, the repo rate was lower than normal for most of the period leading up to the crisis. A more rapid increase of the repo rate would thus have been better. There are also two other circumstances that I for my own part believe were unfortunate. The first is that I did not enter a reservation in April 2006 when the Executive Board decided not to increase the repo rate, which I regretted afterwards. This would not have made any difference to the actual development of interest rates, but it would have been a good idea to make my view clear already at that time.

Page 1 sur 8  Asociación de Mercados Financieros Annual Financial Convention Madrid, 21 November 2016 François Villeroy de Galhau, Governor of the Banque de France Europe facing a new political economy  Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen, Thank you for your invitation. I am grateful for the opportunity to speak here in Madrid today with my friend Governor L. Linde, in the midst of the Spanish financial community, and in a country which has demonstrated its active commitment to the European project since it joined the European Union thirty years ago. We have come a long way in Europe and our common history and past success will help us look ahead in these challenging times. The Brexit referendum in June and Mr. Trump’s victory two weeks ago have indeed come as shocks for Europe: both have increased uncertainty and are raising questions about the European identity. How should we, as Europeans, react? Not by less Europe: this would clearly be a mistake if we want to collectively master our own destiny in this new world. But by a better Europe, a more focused and efficient one. In concrete terms, we need to adapt in two ways: first, by building actively on our economic and social assets – among them our single currency and monetary policy; second, by coming together around a few new select priorities – including tackling the current “investment crunch”. **  Page 2 sur 8 I. First, Europe’s assets in the new “political economy”.