samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
Vahur Kraft: A successful Estonia - in a successful Europe Speech by Mr Vahur Kraft, Governor of Eesti Pank (Bank of Estonia), at the Euro Conference of Eesti Pank, Tallinn, 3 May 2004. *  *  *  This year spring is going to be different, chirp-chirp! Different, this year different… These are the words by Henrik Visnapuu, an Estonian poet, in his third letter to his beloved Ing in May 1919. May has been a month of important events in the history of Eesti Pank. 85 years ago, on 3 May 1919, the first entry regarding the fixed capital of Eesti Pank was made into the general ledger, and the first payment was accepted into the current account. Thus, 3 May 1919 was the actual day the doors of the Bank opened. (By the way, the historical entry into the general ledger can now be viewed at the Museum of Eesti Pank.) Today, on 3 May 2004, Eesti Pank made its first share capital transfer to the European Central Bank. Eesti Pank has become a member of the European System of Central Banks, one of the owners of the European Central Bank. Today, 3 May 2004 is already the third day of being a fully-fledged member state of the European Union. Two out of three Estonian citizens voted for accession to the European Union in the referendum held last September. What is going to happen now? This is largely up to us.

Liquidity is lent against sufficient collateral and is subject to an interest rate that is higher than the policy rate. 2/4  BIS - Central bankers' speeches  SNB's contribution to managing Credit Suisse crisis This brings me to Credit Suisse. Credit Suisse has long struggled to cope with a loss of confidence and with outflows of client funds. The collapse of Silicon Valley Bank in the US triggered a swift deterioration of the situation in mid-March, despite the fact that there was no direct link between the bank in California and Credit Suisse. Credit Suisse's counterparties cut credit limits and clients withdrew deposits at a rapid rate. If Credit Suisse had collapsed, many Swiss households and SMEs would no longer have had access to their deposits, and payments via Credit Suisse would no longer have been executed. Furthermore, SMEs in particular would no longer have been able to benefit from existing credit limits at Credit Suisse and maturing loans would not have been renewed. The economic fallout would have been enormous. But there was even more at stake here. The collapse of Credit Suisse would have sent a shockwave through the global financial system. The consequences for the real economy, both in Switzerland and abroad, would have been dramatic. This extremely demanding situation required quick and decisive action. The federal government, FINMA and the SNB worked together under high-pressure conditions to find a solution that was viable and as market-based as possible in order to safeguard financial stability and protect the Swiss economy.
•  Authorities have already taken significant steps to design a regulatory framework that could stimulate innovation while preserving financial stability. The European MiCA regulation is a necessary first response to regulate the use of crypto-assets and it needs to be implemented as soon as possible. However, let me stress the MiCA regulation is not an end in itself but rather the start of a process. Our regulatory framework will need to be adjusted on a regular basis to keep up with the development of DeFi. •  In addition, these responses from public authorities need to be coordinated at the international level, to avoid arbitrage across jurisdictions. International bodies have a central role to play in coordinating responses, notably the BIS and the FSB, but also the IMF and the OECD. Page 2/3  My third takeaway is that central banks could accompany usefully the tokenization of finance, by leveraging new technologies to provide central bank digital currencies, thereby improving the efficiency of securities settlement and payment systems. •  The discussion showed that this possible positive impact is not confined to retail payments. o A wholesale CBDC directly integrated on DLT could be used to settle tokenised assets, bringing the security of central bank money. In addition, a wholesale CBDC has the potential to improve cross-border payments. o But we need to properly measure the economic impacts and the associated risks. That is why we are working on it step by step, including through experimentation with private actors.

Conference Banque de France ”Opportunities and challenges of the tokenisation of finance: which role for central banks?”  Tuesday 27 September 2022  Concluding remarks by Denis Beau, First Deputy Governor  Let me first start by thanking you all for attending this conference, both online and in person. I believe this large audience speaks to the significance of the issues that we have discussed together today and the depth and quality of today’s exchanges, which covered a wide variety of topics, were impressive. It is a tall order to summarise such rich discussions in so little time. I will only try to highlight three lessons I take away from each of the roundtables and chart a possible way forward. The first lesson I take away from this conference is that we could be at a turning point in the development of the crypto-asset ecosystem. • Over the past few years, the crypto-asset landscape has experienced a significant growth, buoyed in part by the low interest rate environment. It has expanded its initial scope and started offering more sophisticated products, getting increasingly complex and interwoven with traditional finance, with the emergence of DeFi. • However, recent tensions in the crypto-asset ecosystem, amidst a normalisation of monetary policy, raise questions about (i) first, its correlation with other types of risky assets and (ii) second, their sensitivity to changes in the monetary policy stance. The ongoing stress in the crypto-asset market is also altering the dynamics of the ecosystem, sparking bankruptcies and leading toward greater concentration.
China Finance: What needs to be done to meet the challenges to the credibility of Euro posed by persistent dispersions of inflation, current account deficit and public finance among the member economies? Trichet: The first 10 years of the euro has brought low levels of inflation overall in the euro area, lower than the levels in the individual countries before. The existing differences are no bigger than if you compare differences in price levels, for example, between various states in the United States, which is as you know similar in size to the euro area. The single currency also enhanced price transparency, increased trade, and promoted economic and financial integration within the euro area and with the rest of the world. As for public finances, the Stability and Growth Pact was created precisely to substitute for a more uniform fiscal arm of the euro area. As you are aware, there was an agreement reached in the EU late last year to provide fiscal stimulus corresponding to the current economic slowdown, however, on behalf of the Governing Council I reiterated several times that these packages should be provided by countries only if they have the leeway granted in the SGP. China Finance: In view of the increasing interests of adopting Euro from non-member countries in times of financial turmoils, how do you see the need to balance between the expansion of the Eurozone and maintaining its stability? Trichet: As said before, the financial crisis certainly reemphasised the value of belonging to a large, single currency area.

And in such a case, when confidence is lacking, additional public expenditure will not have a positive effect on growth. On the second question, following an episode in which the pricing of risks was, in general, too low, markets now have a tendency to overvalue risks. But it does not affect the euro as a currency. Rather, it is clear that the single currency has proved to be an anchor of confidence and stability during this crisis. If you think back to the European currency turbulence and its consequences in 1992 and 1993, you can imagine what consequences the crisis of recent months would have had for the euro area without the euro – both on the interest rate markets and on the exchange markets. China Finance: What challenges do the US quantitative easing policy pose for the Euro area? What's your assessment on the need for coordination on economic and monetary policies between the major economies in bringing about an early recovery of the global economy? Trichet: I believe that all central banks are doing what is necessary for the economic area they are responsible for and responding to the requirements of the specific conditions. I do not see the point in comparing one central bank’s actions with the other. As I said before, the ECB’s open market operations and collateral framework of today are already in a “nonstandard” mode and its measures can be interpreted as a way of additional “non standard risk taking”.
We are determined not to let inflation become entrenched through second-round effects. It is this determination that would permit us to keep expectations where they are. WSJ: Since the current rise in inflation is due in large part to the buoyancy of emerging countries, are you worried that controlling inflation is to some extent out of your control? Noyer: It’s true that there are factors beyond our direct control. But there are also structural answers to these factors, such as development of production, in order to limit the rise in agricultural prices. There are possibilities, and the level of prices helps a lot to develop production and alleviate the pressure. When we look at the global picture of economy, there are emerging countries which have suffered less from the economic crisis and advanced economies which had to recover from a much lower growth and even recession. That in turn creates problems for emerging economies, including the fact that some of them have hesitated to run the fiscal and monetary policy that would have been absolutely appropriate given the state of their economies. That calls for a better understanding of each other’s state of economic development and economic policies. That’s what the G-20 wants to do through the framework for strong and sustainable growth initiative. WSJ: The G-20 is looking at various factors to assess the nature of global imbalances, and the debate often focuses on the part that foreign exchange rates should play in this assessment.

Noyer: There was probably during the period of time that preceded the crisis an excessive belief that the combination of the growing importance of emerging economies, which brought a disinflationary force in the manufacturing sector, and the credibility attained by central banks globally had created a world where inflation could be kept at bay quite easily. There was insufficient focus on some of the effects of low interest rates for a long period, like the fact that it facilitated asset bubbles and asset bubbles may lead to burst bubbles and economic and financial crisis or the transmission into pressure on inflation. We’ll probably be more attentive in the future. WSJ: The ECB has upped its vigilance on inflation in the euro zone, but if interest rates were to b e raised earlier than expected, it could be a problem for countries in the periphery that depend on the ECB’s support through its bond-buying program. Would it be possible for the ECB to raise rates to address rising inflation in core countries while keeping nonstandard measures in place to prop up peripheral states? Noyer: Generally speaking, it is technically feasible. I am not signaling that we are going to raise interest rates. As a matter of fact we have done a lot to start unwinding nonstandard measures. Excess liquidity in the euro-system has decreased dramatically and the situation has normalized. Now the market is working much better.
This would increase greatly the chances of Mackay’s “madness of crowds”. Finally, let’s try an interior solution – say 1,000 people each spending 10 hours. This is large enough a number to gather most of the benefits of diversity, but small enough to harvest the benefits of deliberation. It would blend expert and non-expert opinion in a way which would allow collective deliberation. This is the “wisdom of crowds” solution. Figure 2 plots the relationship between insight and the numbers of people providing information in a group, in stylised terms. You might call it the “Insight Curve”. The curve (shown in dotted lines) results from combining the effects of a downward-sloping “deliberation” curve and an upward-sloping “diversity” curve. Consistent with the evidence, both exhibit diminishing returns. The inverted U-shaped “Insight Curve” identifies the optimal number of people to draw on to inform a complex decision. The two corner solutions – the “Oracle” (single person) and the “Madness of Crowds” (population) – involve very different trade-offs between diversity and deliberation. A single source of information gives you plenty of time for deliberation – a hermit-like 10,000 hours. But it leaves you short of diversity of thought. A population-wide pool of information gives us as much diversity as you could ever wish. But it leaves you long fast-thinkers, short slow-thinkers and vulnerable to irrationality. 15  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches  15  Both are inferior to an intermediate solution – the “Wisdom of Crowds” solution.

These go by the name econoME. As the name suggests, and like our recent public communications efforts, these materials describe the economy and finance in terms which are personal and relatable to young people’s lives. Why does the economy and finance matter to me? And how do my decisions in turn affect the economy? We set ourselves a target of reaching 400 state schools with econoME during the course of this year. So far since launch in April, over 1,000 schools have downloaded the materials, conceivably covering around 90,000 pupils. 52  This demonstrates the potential pent-up demand for school materials on economic and  financial issues. The Bank’s aim is to reach close to 1,500 schools by mid-2020. We are currently considering where next to take our education initiatives. A promising avenue would be a younger age range, say 7-11 year olds. This will require different materials and possibly a different approach. A more challenging market still would be adults, perhaps linked to existing initiatives to boost  50 51 52  Haldane (2018a) and Barnes et al (2017). ING-Economics Network Survey of the Public’s Understanding of Economics (2017). Assuming 30 students per class and 3 classes per school. 22  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches  22  economic and financial literacy in the public at large. The scale of the public understanding deficit means central bank efforts can only be part of the solution but, as public institutions, an important part.
Caleb M Fundanga: The central bank, the media and the legislature – can they work together? Remarks by Dr Caleb M Fundanga, Governor of the Bank of Zambia, at the 35th anniversary of the Central Bank of Swaziland, Mbabame, 21 May 2009. *  *  *  Governor M.G. Dlamini, Fellow Central Bank Governors, Your Excellencies the Members of the Diplomatic Corps, Distinguished Guests, Ladies and gentlemen, And May I simply Say All Protocol Observed, Mr. Chairman, it is indeed a great pleasure for me to be with you today as we commemorate the 35th Anniversary of the Central Bank of Swaziland. I consider it a great honour and privilege, on behalf of the Bank of Zambia and indeed on my own behalf, to have been invited to give a keynote speech at this historic event. Mr. Chairman, allow me to first of all congratulate the Central Bank of Swaziland, the Government and all other stakeholders for having come a long way in promoting the effective conduct of monetary policy in this great country over the last 35 years. We at the Bank of Zambia have noted the important role that the Central Bank of Swaziland has played not only in the development of the Swazi economy, but in enriching the knowledge of central bankers throughout the region, through its participation in the regional groupings such as the Committee of Central Bank Governor’s in SADC.

This would imply that the taking into account of CSR in management models would result in a certain form of self-regulation, for example with recognised codes of conduct. Different incentives are contributing to this, such as pressure from direct stakeholders and NGOs and regulatory incentives, in particular in terms of reporting. Lastly, I would like to say a few words about the Banque de France. I wish to stress that, as a company, CSR is of great importance. Its current sustainable development strategy combines a two-pronged approach: an Environmental Footprint Reduction Programme and a review of its tasks in the light of sustainable development. In this respect, the Banque de France will, for example, seek to develop the financial culture of the public, spread best practice in the fight against money laundering, encourage economic and financial research in new fields, such as the development of “carbon finance”. I attach great importance to these subjects, and my wish is to see the Banque de France adopt its own sustainable development charter, which formalises its commitments. This should be achieved by the end of this year and will no doubt further enhance the actions of the Banque de France. In the light of this collective awareness of the environmental (finitude and fragility of natural resources), economic and societal implications, central banks perform their task of preserving financial stability while taking into account and anticipating events. This approach, as recent developments have shown, has to be increasingly systemic and co-operative, involving companies, banks, governments and central banks.
The dynamics of the political cycle in 2021 led to a pause in the institutions’ work in the process in the country. All the factors are now in place for its resumption through the continuation of the Coordination Council for Bulgaria’s preparations for euro area membership; and the institutionalisation of the Euro Adoption Plan. The draft of this plan, adopted by the Coordination Council on 30.06.2021, has already gone through the formal procedure of public consultation and inter-agency coordination, and has the support of our external partners. In spite of the delay in the formal process, the BNB remained the institution that continued to work actively in all areas related to the euro area accession, falling within the scope of our responsibilities. To this end, we established the necessary internal organisation of work and good operational communication with the European Central Bank. Specific individuals and channels for partnership were identified on both sides. In this sense, the central bank is ready to carry out the huge amount of technical work related to the adoption of the euro in a timely manner, notwithstanding the emerging tighter work schedule. In conclusion, 2022 is promising to be a year of challenges but also opportunities for the banking sector. The achievements of 2021 show that the sector is in a strong starting position to meet the challenges and make good use of the opportunities. 3/3  BIS central bankers' speeches

For an independent central bank to be perceived as legitimate in a democracy, it must be granted a clear mandate against which its performance can be assessed. However, the environment in which central banks operate is highly complex, and conditions can change rapidly. For this reason, mandates usually only sketch out a framework for central banks’ operations. This gives them much-needed flexibility in difficult situations. As a counterweight to its independence, a central bank has a duty to report on its actions, and the results. Indeed, the SNB has regularly provided detailed reports on matters relating to both monetary policy and financial stability. For example, it has explained the rationale behind deciding to discontinue the minimum exchange rate or introduce the negative interest rate, and how these measures have helped it to fulfil its mandate. As regards financial stability, the fact that macroprudential instruments often have powerful distribution effects speaks against handing over the entire responsibility for such instruments to the central bank. In contrast to monetary policy, these measures are sometimes targeted at specific sectors and groups, and thus also have fiscal implications. In Switzerland, macroprudential tasks have therefore been divided up between the government, the financial market supervisory authority and the SNB. The SNB is responsible for assessing the systemic importance of banks and financial market infrastructures, and plays a key role in the deployment of the countercyclical capital buffer. 1/1  BIS central bankers' speeches
6  3  Uncertainty about the distribution over time and the use of the NGEU programme’s funds also conditions the projections. In this case, as regards our December forecast, a delay in the investment expenditure financed by the programme in 2021 is assumed. Accordingly, the impact on GDP is expected to fall from 1.3 pp in December to 1 pp in the latest projections, with the estimated contribution for 2022 rising at the same time, as a result of the assumptions that funds not invested this year will be applied the following year. Based on these assumptions, GDP would grow by 6% in 2021 under the baseline scenario, dipping to 3.2% under the severe scenario and increasing to 7.5% under the mild scenario. Following a sluggish first half of the year, activity would quicken in the second half under the baseline scenario. Greater dynamism as from the summer would give rise to a powerful carryover effect in 2022, added to by the greater estimated impact of the European funds for next year, whereby GDP would post high growth in 2022 of 5.3%, before easing to 1.7% in 2023. These figures represent a downward revision of 0.8 pp in GDP growth for this year compared with those projected in December. The lesser momentum of activity in the short term and, to a lesser extent, the revised distribution of spending under the European funds largely account for this revision.

In the new banking package, the concept of “transition plans” is important. Under Article 76 of the proposed amendments to the Capital Requirements Directive (CRD VI)[13], a bank’s management board is required to monitor and address environmental risks arising in the short, medium and long term. [14] Banks have to make sure that their business model and strategy are not misaligned with the relevant Union policy objectives towards a sustainable economy and they need to manage potential risks from such misalignments. Article 11 TFEU, the requirement to integrate environmental requirements into the policies and activities of the Union, plays a role in supervision. The ECB has a duty to integrate the Climate Law’s neutrality objectives into its supervisory policies and activities. However, we have some discretion as to how we do this. After all, the climate neutrality objective affects the ECB’s mandate in many respects and Article 11 TFEU does not prescribe how the ECB should integrate the environmental requirements. Do not expect us to act to regulate or enforce environmental policies. We will stick to our mandate. Our mandate is to keep under control the risks that banks and the financial system are facing, and in that capacity we have to look closely at the risks that are building up in the banking sector as a consequence of the climate crisis. Lastly, I would like to draw your attention to the work of the Central Banks and Supervisors Network for Greening the Financial System (NGFS).