samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
In addition, it will not be able to offer innovative products like investment linked products, which can further diversify their investment portfolio as these products are gaining popularity among conventional insurance companies. In the absence of an Islamic banking system, takaful operators would not be able to synergise and utilise the network of the banking system through bancassurance which can not only be an effective distribution channel but also serve to drive down operating costs. The development of a comprehensive Islamic financial infrastructure in Malaysia that includes Islamic banking, the money and capital markets has reinforced the development of the takaful business. 2  BIS Review 43/2003  Today, the takaful industry in Malaysia has emerged as a fast growing industry within the insurance sector since its introduction in 1985, 18 years ago. From total assets amounting to only USD0.5 million in 1986, it has reached more than USD900 million in 2002, constituting 5.2 per cent of the total assets of the insurance sector. In the same period, the takaful operators have offerred a wide range of family and general takaful products. The Malaysian Financial Sector Master Plan represents the blueprint for the development of the financial sector over a 10-year period. The plan, which was launched in 2001, places importance on the development of Islamic banking and takaful sector as an important component in the financial system.

Average life expectancy continued to rise sharply over the period, however. When it then became increasingly obvious during the 1990s that the ATP system was also going to be under-financed, a number of years of political debate passed before a majority of the Swedish parliament could agree on a new pension system that would be sustainable in the long term. With the implementation of the premium-reserve pension reform of 1998, a system was created that indeed is not guaranteed to result in high pensions for pension savers, but that at least will enable the public finances to bear the costs as an increasing number of people retire. However, Sweden is not the only country to be facing a difficult demographic challenge, quite the reverse. In the euro area, some countries will have a considerably larger frequency of retirement in the coming decades, which means that in 30 years there will be twice the number of pensioners per worker compared with today. Nevertheless, until recently pension reforms in most euro area countries have been conspicuous by their absence. In addition, the majority of these countries have only used a system whereby current pensioners are paid directly by current workers, and no funds have been reserved. The fact that this is unsustainable in the long run has been obvious for a long period. Yet, it has been politically impossible to bring about the kind of reforms that we in Sweden succeeded in introducing through political accord.
Start ups are well aware of this, but our scale-ups, midcaps and SMEs also need greater access to equity leverage. In this field, our economy, like that of our neighbours in the euro area, is seriously lagging behind: in France, equity only accounted for 64% of GDP at end-2016, which is half as much as in the United States (128%). It is true that French and European savers are very attached to safe investments. The bulk (69%) of the EUR 4,765 billion in financial wealth held by French households is invested in interest rate products, compared to only 31% in equity products, i.e. invested in corporate capital in the form of listed or unlisted shares.1 However, it is important to distinguish, with respect to savers’ expectations concerning security, two components: they are attached to the protection of capital, even more so than to liquidity. With the increase in life expectancy, and with a greater need to prepare their retirement, savers are increasingly being steered towards long-term products; the liquidity component is becoming less decisive. Here, insurers have an essential role to play, by taking the lead on new forms of life insurance that aim for a three-fold compatibility: with low interest rates, our economy’s need for equity financing and the expectations of the French people. This requires new long-term savings products that are less liquid but feature a form of capital protection and offer over time the higher equity-type returns. Let me make myself absolutely clear: the development of unit-linked policies is not a sufficient response.

The role of insurers in the digitalisation of our economy It is essential for our economy to adapt to the digital revolution: it creates incredible opportunities, but with them, new risks against which the insurance sector, once again, can bring stability and protection. I would like to discuss two subjects in particular: Firstly, cyber-insurance. The cyber-insurance market is still underdeveloped. Insurers can and should take inspiration from their own experiences in tackling cyber-risk, and use it to develop a more mature French and European cyber-insurance offering. The coverage against cyber-risk is a very real concern that affects all companies – both small and large – as cyber-attacks are becoming increasingly frequent and costly: according to figures from Euler-Hermès, 57% of French companies were victims of these attacks in 2016, compared with 32% in 2015. We at the Banque de France, alongside the Eurosystem and our G7 colleagues, have made cybersecurity one of our strategic priorities. And secondly, personal data and big data. Naturally, the spread of connected objects that is triggering an exponential rise in the amount of data available on insurance policyholders represents an opportunity for the business of insurance, which consists precisely in collecting and exploiting data in order to quantify and put a price on risk. Nonetheless, I would urge insurers to take a responsible approach: we need to strike the right balance between segmentation and the sharing of risk between policyholders. The basic principles of solidarity and risk-pooling that are intrinsic to insurance are at stake.
And once we cut through the legend, what is its significance for economic governance today? The revisionist interpretation of Magna Carta as a timeless statement of natural rights and liberties became imprinted onto the minds of the English-speaking world only in the 17th century. In large part, this was due to the work of Edward Coke. As well as being an enormously influential jurist, Coke was also the author of popular English legal textbooks that exported his views around the world. Coke resurrected the long-forgotten Magna Carta from 400 years of obscurity by appealing to its spirit in order to resist the absolutist tendencies of the Stuart Kings James I and his son Charles I – themselves inspired by the continental European model of monarchic divine-right. The Charter, Coke argued, could trace its lineage from an ancient constitution that harked back not just to the time of pre-Norman King Edward the Confessor, but to King Arthur himself (! ): an ancient constitution that was now being imperilled – and with it the Englishman’s rightful way of life – by the tyrannical behaviour of the Stuarts. 16  John had restored himself to favour from excommunication and placed himself under the protection of Innocent by pronouncing himself a papal vassal, and England a papal fief, in 1213 and subsequently by “taking the cross” in March 1215 – i.e., declaring himself a crusader.

11 Latimer notes that “…between the middle of the twelfth century and the middle of the thirteenth century there was an enormous increase in the quantity of silver coins in England.” As well as the possibility of a general increase in the European silver supply (especially with the opening up of the Harz silver mines in eastern Germany), it is likely that silver inflows to England in particular were boosted as the counterpart to a sizeable private trade surplus – probably resulting, especially, from the success of the wool trade with Flanders. Over several decades, these silver inflows were likely to have much more than offset the “public sector deficit” as silver leaked out to pay for the protection of Normandy as well as the occasional trip to the Holy Land. As a result, the balance of payments was probably in surplus for years, with the consequent increase in the silver money supply going unsterilised. Even to a thirteenth century Englishman, global monetary conditions mattered. Would Britain’s constitutional history have been different had King John lamented: A Central Bank! A Central Bank! My Kingdom for a Central Bank!? He needed one because other factors reinforced monetary developments, including the usual suspect – financial innovation. Specifically, developments in the common law made land an increasingly liquid asset, and therefore one capable for the first time of being used as a store of wealth.
The Riksbank is also studying various measures for changes in the quantity of money as well as bank lending. These quantities also have varying degrees of co-variation with inflation, but with a rather long time-lag. Altogether, it can be said that capacity utilisation, inflation expectations, and the exchange rate are the most important determining factors underlying inflation forecasts. What has been said summarises the main content of the stabilisation policy regime that was established after 1992. On 1 January 1999, the Riksbank was made formally autonomous of political influence and has since then been governed by an executive board of six members. BIS Review 59/1999  6  3. Shall policy control the quantity of money or inflation directly? Some central banks, previously the German Bundesbank and now the European Central Bank, ECB, have an (unclear) quantity of money target for their policy. These banks endeavour to meet the inflation target by trying to control the expansion of the quantity of money. In fact, there are considerable similarities between the methods of aiming at the quantity of money and at inflation. The banks’ means is the repo rate that can be set to affect the quantity of money or inflation. However, as in the case of inflation, the quantity of money cannot either be directly controlled by the repo rate.

It is evident that no wage formation system can operate under such conditions. The labour market researcher (Bertil Holmlund in Uppsala) argued at that time that NAIRU – the unemployment consistent with constant inflation was between 2.5 and 3 per cent, which today appears to be very low. The stabilisation policy problems accumulated towards the end of the 1980s. The Government encountered a crisis situation in 1990 and introduced a prohibition on strikes, a number of freezes such as a wages freeze, a rent freeze, a freeze of local government tax increases among others. The Government announced that Sweden was to apply for membership of the EU. On 15 February, the Government lost a vote in the Riksdag on the prohibition against strikes. Kjell-Olof Feldt resigned (the Minister of Finance). BIS Review 59/1999  2  It can probably be said that the events of autumn 1990 were the last of the old stabilisation policy interventionist kind. The “corporative” co-operation policy had failed. The fact that the end of the road was reached in February 1990 was actually a result of the Government’s own actions in the latter half of the 1980s and its inability to restrict demand. The credit market had been successively deregulated during the 1980s. Foreign exchange regulation began to be dismantled in 1986 and was completely abolished in summer 1989. Foreign exchange policy formally changed course when the krona was linked to the ECU at Whitsun 1991.
Nevertheless, it is not desirable, even for a central bank, to experience a long period of negative equity as this could generate doubts about its credibility. 2 Switzerland: a very special case Although the recent crises have been global in nature, every country has had to define policy in response to the specific circumstances that affect it. The Swiss case is very special as our country still has the leeway to undertake fiscal manoeuvres. Instead, we are confronted by another major challenge, the exceptional power of our currency. As we all know, the increased uncertainty and extreme risk aversion, which arose as a result, drove the Swiss  2  Cf. Jordan (2011) for more details on this topic. BIS central bankers’ speeches  3  franc to an all-time high in early August of 2011, posing a threat to the economy and carrying the risk of severe deflationary developments. As I already mentioned, fiscal policy remained a conceivable means of addressing this problem as our country’s debt-to-GDP ratio is less than 40% and its public sector budget has been in surplus for the last six years. It was not, however, as the massively overvalued Swiss franc first threatened demand for Swiss exports and Switzerland is, of course, not in a position to stimulate the entire world economy. In this particular case, it was inappropriate to resort to fiscal policy. It was therefore up to the SNB to take action. It implemented measures aimed at a substantial and sustained weakening of the Swiss franc.

So the challenge of designing an international monetary system that could prevent the emergence of “too high to last” imbalances remains. The financial crisis has reminded us all of the importance of solving this problem. Sudoku for economists shows that it is essentially a political and not a technical problem: how can we ensure that the economic policy frameworks of countries are consistent with each other? At present there is no political mechanism for achieving that consistency. Finding such a mechanism is urgent. Having narrowed somewhat at the height of the crisis, the imbalances are now widening again. There is a risk that countries will, out of frustration, impose unilateral  BIS Review 4/2010  3  and ultimately self-defeating protectionist responses. Because the number of countries involved in the international trading system is now so large, and the countries so diverse, the idea of another Bretton Woods conference is wholly impractical. The IMF, despite the legitimacy bestowed by its membership of 186 countries, is too unwieldy without reform. The G7 omits some of the key players, such as China. Of more immediate promise is the G20 group of countries, which produces almost 90% of world GDP. Last year, under the UK Presidency, the G20 agreed to a new policy coordination framework which commits member countries to a process, using the expertise of the IMF, of assessing the consistency of their national policies. G20 Heads of Government will meet twice this year, in June and November, to discuss progress.
Liquidity can be supplied generally to the market or in the form of specific assistance for individual financial institutions. The Riksbank has used both of these alternatives. The general liquidity assistance has been designed so that the Riksbank has supplied the banks with loans in kronor and dollars at longer maturities than the market has been able to offer. In total this lending has amounted to over SEK 450 billion. Lending in kronor has increased by more than SEK 250 billion and lending in dollars by almost SEK 200 billion. BIS Review 7/2009  5  This means that the Riksbank's balance sheet for the second half of 2008 has increased from SEK 200 billion at the end of June to SEK 700 billion at the turn of the year. The loans from the Riksbank together with Swedbank's borrowing under the government's guarantee programme mean that the State provided or guaranteed more or less all of the banking sector's borrowing in the last few months of 2008. The Riksbank has also set up a temporary credit facility based on commercial papers in order to improve the supply of credit for non-financial companies. These companies can fund their operations by issuing commercial papers and selling them to the banks. The commercial papers can then be used by the banks as security for loans from the Riksbank. However, the scope of these activities has been fairly limited.

The Icelandic bank Kaupthing experienced problems in Iceland and the Riksbank granted the Swedish subsidiary Kaupthing Bank Sverige AB liquidity assistance in October 2008. Carnegie Investment Bank AB also received liquidity assistance in October when it had problems finding funding. Given the financial market turbulence, the Riksbank’s assessment was that a suspension of payments by one of the banks could entail a risk of a serious disruption in the financial system and could undermine confidence in the payment system. Finansinspektionen (the Swedish financial supervisory authority) later revoked Carnegie’s licence to conduct banking activities. The Swedish National Debt Office took control over Carnegie and Finansinspektionen therefore changed its decision regarding the revocation of the licence to instead giving the bank a warning. The Riksbank’s liquidity assistance has been repaid. The Riksbank has also participated in the international cooperation to strengthen financial stability in Sweden's neighbouring countries. In May 2008, the Riksbank and the central banks in Denmark and Norway entered into a euro/Icelandic kronor swap agreement with the central bank of Iceland. The aim of this swap agreement is to support the Icelandic central bank in its efforts to safeguard macroeconomic and financial stability. Sweden's part of the swap agreement amounts to EUR 500 million. The agreement was extended in December after the IMF had drawn up a programme for financial assistance for Iceland. Latvia has negotiated a support package with the IMF and the EU which will make it possible for the country to retain its fixed exchange rate against the euro.
The aim of the CBRT’s road map is to improve the resiliency of the economy to external shocks through (i) maturity lengthening – encouraging banks to shift their non-core liabilities from short-term to long-term; (ii) providing incentives to banks for borrowing and lending directly from and to the Central Bank on times when foreign players are reluctant to engage with banks in Turkey due to heightened volatility in global markets; (iii) bolstering safety-nets – making sure that the banking sector has access to adequate foreign exchange liquidity in times of market stress; (iv) supporting financial stability – providing incentives to banks to improve loan to deposit ratios; and (v) simplifying the monetary policy framework to improve the communication of the monetary policy stance. All but the interest rate corridor simplification step on the roadmap have already been taken and the focus is now firmly on fine-tuning their parameters. Overall, these measures ease the policy tradeoffs posed by the excessive volatility in cross border flows, enabling the interest rate policy to concentrate on the primary objective of price stability. So far the financial market performance of Turkey suggests that the measures undertaken since August 2015 have helped Turkey outperform many peer EM countries. Of course, on the way, Turkey also enjoyed the benefits of lower oil prices relatively more than many EMEs and reduced political uncertainty after the general election result in November 2015.

With a clear view of the important role that insurers have in serving and supporting the economy, there is every potential for this to be realised. 4  BIS central bankers’ speeches
Caleb M Fundanga: Foreign private investment in Zambia Opening remarks by Dr Caleb M Fundanga, Governor of the Bank of Zambia, at the Closing and Dissemination Workshop on Foreign Private Investment and Investor Perceptions Survey, Lusaka, 20 January 2011. *  *  *  The Deputy Secretary to the Cabinet, Mr Evans Chibiliti; The Deputy permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Works and Supply, Mrs Bweupe Kaonga; The MEFMI Executive Director, Dr Elias Ngalande; The IMF Country Representative, Mr Perry Perone; Heads of Government Departments present; Chief Executive Officers of various Companies and Associations present Colleagues from Bank of Zambia; Distinguished Participants; Members of the Press; Ladies and Gentlemen. It is my honour and privilege to officiate at this very important Closing and Dissemination workshop of Phase III of the Survey on Foreign Private Investment and Investor Perceptions. As I welcome you all, I wish to convey my appreciation for your contributions to the success of this project. May I, in this regard, express our special appreciation to the private sector colleagues for their cooperation during the survey. Let me also take this opportunity to extend my sincere gratitude to the Private Sector Development (PSD) Programme, for providing financial support for this very important project. Further, our thanks go to the Macroeconomic and Financial Management Institute (MEFMI), and Development Finance International (DFI) for providing technical support to this survey.

With their technical support, the Government, through the Balance of Payments Statistical Committee, comprising representatives from the Ministry of Commerce, Trade and Industry, Ministry of Tourism and Natural Resources, Zambia Development Agency, Central Statistical Office and Bank of Zambia, was able to undertake this very important survey. Distinguished Participants, As you are aware, the Zambian economy has recorded significant positive developments in the recent past, owing to the economic reforms the Government has been implementing since 1992. These reforms have facilitated foreign investments in various sectors of the economy. These reforms have also resulted in Zambia recording tremendous improvement in world ranking with regard to the ease of doing business. The favourable investment climate created has raised investor confidence in the Zambian economy thereby attracting both local and foreign investments. Ladies and Gentlemen, the survey findings we are disseminating today show that the overall Foreign Private Investment inflows in 2009, declined to US $ million from US $ million recorded in 2007. This was explained mainly by the notable reduction in re-invested earnings, due to lower profits recorded by enterprises during the year. The overall reduction in foreign investment inflows is also consistent with global developments. In fact, at a global level, foreign direct Investment inflows drastically declined to US $ billion in 2009 from US $ billion in 2008 and US $ billion in 2007. Nonetheless, new equity investment inflows in Zambia surged to US $ million in 2009 from US $ million recorded in 2007.