samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
Changes in expectations about when and how fast it will finally occur have affected world financial markets significantly. By contrast, in the Eurozone and other developed and emerging economies, monetary policy has become more expansionary, largely responding to the lower inflation figures and lower  BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  medium-term inflation outlook. Such scenario is quite opposite to what we are seeing in Chile and Latin America in general. The Eurozone showed a more stable output trajectory towards the end of 2014, driven by Germany. Preliminary first-quarter figures suggest that Germany will continue to lead the bloc. It is also worth mentioning that in 2014 Spain posted positive GDP figures after three years in recession. Meanwhile, Italy and France continue to show meager results. All in all, in the past few months the region’s growth prospects have improved. In our baseline scenario, we expect the Eurozone to grow 1.5 percent this year, up from 1 percent in December. Still, there are some risks relating to the political situation, especially what may happen in Greece. About Latin America, there is a marked deterioration of the region’s economies, which is compounded with lower commodity prices and in some countries, public and private expenditure imbalances. So while the main economies in the region grew on average nearly 4 percent between 2010 and 2013, in 2014 they barely grew 0.7 percent in 2014 and are expected to grow by 0.8 percent this year.

Moreover, the space for fiscal stimulus has narrowed, as a result of the orientation of the fiscal policy towards maintaining fiscal parameters stability. Under these circumstances, Albania’s economic growth will be determined mainly by the performance of consumption and private investment. The latter is expected to be driven by eased domestic lending terms during 2012, but will suffer, at the same time, from the uncertainty and hesitation of consumers and private businesses. The Bank of Albania deems that the second half of 2011 marked a turning point towards a more normal consumer behaviour, which should be encouraged and supported in 2012. *** Taking into consideration the information set out above, the Supervisory Council holds that pressures on consumer prices at home remain low over the monetary policy relevant horizon and they have shifted on the down side over the past months. On the demand side, below-potential economic growth will continue to generate low inflationary pressures as shocks from the supply side are expected to be moderate. At the conclusion of discussions, the Supervisory Council decided to cut the key interest rate by 0.25 percentage points bringing it down to 4.25%. This decision aims to provide the appropriate monetary conditions to meet the medium-term inflation target. In addition, the easing of monetary policy provides higher support for the development of the private sector’s demand in our economy. 2  BIS central bankers’ speeches
“Do not trust strangers” was a learned evolutionary heuristic, a simple and robust decision-making rule to guard against the threat of extinction. Paranoia in primitive man was rational – everyone really was out to get you. Psychologists call this ecological rationality. 4 Fear of strangers was a rational response to the ecology of the time. This behavioural trait is shared by other primates, such as apes. 5 What is interesting is that these primordial fears may have persisted long after the ecology itself has changed. To give a trivial example, fear of snakes, spiders and dense rainforests probably arose on the grasslands of Africa in 50,000 BC. It was an ecologically rational response then. Whether it is an ecologically rational response on the high streets of Edinburgh and London today is altogether more questionable. What is true about fear of snakes and spiders is true, too, about fear of strangers. The evolutionary heuristic – “do not trust a stranger” – remains alive and well today. And in some situations, it remains a useful guide. Among parents, it is a simple but still powerful decisionmaking rule for children. As Benjamin Franklin put it: “Distrust and caution are the parents of security”. At the same time, this neurological relic from the ancient past may be seriously out of kilter with the workings of a modern, multi-cultural society.

So far, more than 3600 people have completed the modules and a substantial number of them, one in five, have decided not to proceed with the purchase. This points to two things. Firstly, the module is successful in nudging participants to reassess their existing financial obligations before they can take on more than what they can handle. Secondly, it reinforces the need to continue pushing for financial education. Individuals need to know their capacity, and what they can afford before undertaking a commitment of this magnitude. We have established that every individual needs to play their part to ensure that they are fully aware of and are able to undertake the commitment of buying a house. However, the responsibility does not reside with the buyers alone. Industry players in the private sector also 1/3  BIS central bankers' speeches  have a role to play to support the national agenda of affordable homes. As one of the core players in the housing market, developers have a significant role to play. In providing the supply of homes for the public, developers should seek to provide homes at an affordable price point. Using international affordability metrics, houses in Malaysia are considered to be “seriously unaffordable” with a median multiple of five times. This, in turn, affects home ownership. Take the latest data of unsold residential properties of about 171,000 units. About 74% of them are priced beyond what ordinary Malaysians can afford.
This stands in stark contrast with the mystique and opaqueness which characterized earlier central bank communication. For a long time central banks have focused predominantly on their interest rate policy. Considerably less attention has been devoted to their liquidity policy which used to be carried out somewhere in the basement of the monetary policy temple, far away from the spotlight of the announcement of interest rate decisions. This year, liquidity policy has moved into the spotlight and has taken over the lead role at the forefront of the monetary policy scene. The current situation also highlights the close interaction between price stability and financial stability and that the focus of policy makers today is on crisis management. The challenge in the coming months and year is to pursue a dual approach consisting of short-term action and long-term solutions. We must constantly be on the alert to put out fires when and where they emerge, while studying the causes of the current crisis and finding the right long-term remedies in the form of new rules and systems so that we do not repeat the same mistakes. As the French saying goes, there is no point in putting a band-aid on a wooden leg. 2  Ecklund, Gunhild (2008), Creating a new role for an old central bank: The Bank of Norway 1945-1954, Series of Dissertations No. 2-2008, BI Norwegian School of Management. 3  Sejersted, Francis (1994), On the so-called “autonomy” or “independence” of central banks.

Jan F Qvigstad: Writing central bank and monetary history – what are the issues? Welcome remarks by Mr Jan F Qvigstad, Deputy Governor of Norges Bank (Central Bank of Norway), at a workshop co-organised by The Graduate Institute, Geneva and Norges Bank, Oslo, 30 October 2008. *  *  *  Dear participants, It is a great pleasure for me to welcome all of you to the first workshop in Norges Bank’s Bicentenary Project. In particular I want to express a warm welcome to those of you who have travelled far. Norges Bank and the Graduate Institute here in Geneva are privileged to host a workshop with such a distinguished group of international experts in central bank and monetary history from academic institutions and from the central bank community all over Europe and from the US. The financial crisis that was unleashed in the US more than a year ago went into uncharted waters on 15 September this year. Since then G7, IMF and governments all over the world have taken active policy measures that hopefully will steer the financial world into smoother water, although the real economy probably will be in dire straits the next year or two. It might seem strange, and a bit of an intellectual escapism in this situation, to gather here in Geneva to discuss economics in a hundred year perspective.
The establishment of the Central Bank was an element in these changes, and its activities were part of broader-based measures. From the outset, the Central Bank’s position was strong. It is remarkable that among us here today are a number of people who were important thinkers and agents of change at that time. Honoured guests: As I mentioned earlier, we are faced at present with the need to formulate future monetary and financial stability policies. The review of the Act on the Central Bank of Iceland will presumably be a part of that process. The Central Bank will participate actively in this work, but many others will be involved, and the Bank looks forward to collaborating with them. Ultimately, however, it is Parliament, and in some instances the people themselves, who have the last word. In closing, I would like to thank the Central Bank’s many collaborators for a successful cooperative relationship over the past year. I want no less to thank the employees of the Central Bank for their tireless efforts, for without their contribution, the Bank’s work would bear very little fruit. And in closing, I want to express my gratitude to the many individuals who have put their shoulders to the wheel at the Central Bank of Iceland over the past 50 years. It is a pleasure to see so many of you here today. BIS central bankers’ speeches  3

This year, with the help from the Law Society of Hong Kong, eminent law professors in the field, consultancy firms, and the Applied Science and Technology Research Institute, I am pleased to say we have compiled the DLT whitepaper 2.0 to provide advice on over 20 governance, control, legal and compliance issues identified in the first whitepaper. 16. While there have been lively discussions in the fintech community on the technology and application aspects of DLT over the past year, there has not been enough focus on the deployment and implementation issues gathered from practical and diverse proof-of-concept applications. There have been very few suggestions to address the governance, control, legal and compliance issues raised by DLT. 17. In our second whitepaper, we have confirmed the promising nature of DLT while acknowledging that DLT cannot be a universal solution for all financial applications. Experts taking part in our research have also confirmed that the issues identified in the first whitepaper are valid and that many of them would need new thinking to overcome. While the solution will depend on the precise application, the whitepaper has provided broad advice in areas such as the importance of governance structure and its implications on the level of control and liability acceptable to participants, how a hybrid model of DLT and traditional database may be used to resolve the immutability nature of DLT in the storage of personal data, the limits of smart contracts, and the need of adequate security and controls over the operating environment of DLT. 18.
The sensitivity of wages to the cyclical situation has stepped up since mid-2012 which, in principle, suggests the labour market is functioning more in step with developments in the economy and the clearly declining trend of inflation. Indeed, in September the consumer price index posted a year-onyear rate of 0.3%, resuming a favourable difference vis-à-vis our European partners. The excessive dependence of the Spanish economy on the construction sector in the previous expansion no doubt entailed a factor of vulnerability. From the onset of the crisis in 2008, the deterioration of this sector was continuous; from then to the second quarter of this year, its real value added posted a cumulative decline of more than 40%, far higher than that recorded by the market economy as a whole, which did not exceed 10%. A major challenge facing the Spanish economy today is to have other industries, other than construction, take up the baton in terms of the creation of value added. And here, too, there are positive signs in recent quarters. The industrial sector achieved moderately positive growth in the second quarter, helped no doubt by the sound performance of exports. And the same occurred with the services sector. Despite the containment of labour costs and while bearing in mind that the data show a less adverse trend in unemployment, this is the most serious of our macroeconomic imbalances and that showing most resistance to correction.

Some analysts estimate – and at the Banco de España this appears to be a technically reasonable estimate – that, owing to the labour reforms, the economic growth threshold for job creation may have been lowered, which should impel the start of a correction in the unemployment rate with what are still moderate GDP growth rates. As regards private-sector debt, Spanish households strongly increased their debt in the expansion preceding the crisis; their debt ratio rose from less than 70% of gross disposable income in 2000 to close to 130% in 2007 and 2008. Non-financial corporations moved on a  2  BIS central bankers’ speeches  similar path, which lasted longer over time, with their debt ratio climbing from over 60% of GDP in 2000 to a peak of over 140% in 2010. Here, too, there are signs of correction. Since 2010, households’ and firms’ debt has fallen by almost 10 pp and 20 pp, respectively. Admittedly, though, such restructuring is slow as a result of weak nominal growth in household and corporate income. But the soundness of the recovery will unquestionably also depend on the progress made in normalising financing flows. Since 2009, outstanding credit extended by our banking system to Spanish non-financial corporations and households has been contracting uninterruptedly. As at September 2013 it was 5.4% lower than a year earlier, but the decline was more marked for firms than for households: a decline of somewhat more than 9% for the former, and of 4.5% for the latter.
It is the financial stability of the euro area as a whole which is at stake, and this creates difficulties for our monetary policy transmission. Taking into account the reality of the situation we have reactivated a number of non-standard measures. Many people nonetheless fear that the continuous flooding of the markets with new money will lead to inflation in the medium term. This fear is totally unfounded. First the Securities Market Programme (SMP), namely the purchase of Treasuries on the secondary market, is not at all a quantitative easing programme. We are rigorously withdrawing all the liquidity which is provided. As regards all our non-standard measures, the balance sheet of the ECB has expanded by 77% since the beginning of the crisis; that of the US Federal Reserve System by 226%. This gives a measure of our relative prudence in this very grave crisis. And we are fully credible to deliver price stability over the next 10 years, according to observers and market participants. In the spring, the ECB spoke out against the restructuring of Greek debt which was being discussed at that time. Now there is again discussion of a debt restructuring. Does your opposition still stand? In the spring, the Governing Council of the ECB unanimously made the following points. We cannot accept the securities of a state in default, even for a short period of time, as collateral for the refinancing of banks without an appropriate credit enhancement. Similarly, we said that a credit event should be avoided.

If we instead look at the exchange rate adjusted for inflation differences, the “real” exchange rate, we find some traditional explanations for much of the weakening that has taken place from the 1970s until the mid-1990s. Our terms of trade were weakened, productivity developed more weakly in Sweden than in other countries and during certain periods investors were concerned over a rapidly growing central government debt. However, developments during the latter part of the 1990s were rather different. The growth in productivity and GDP has been better and the inflation rate as low as the average among our main trading partners, while the central government debt has declined, which should have favoured a stronger krona. Nevertheless, the krona has depreciated. 2  A more detailed discussion of the stabilisation policy tools within the EMU can be found in the report “Stability and stabilisation policy in the EMU” (SOU 2001:62), which can be downloaded from http://finans.regeringen.se/propositionermm/sou/index.htm. BIS Review 92/2001  3  A small part of the most recent depreciation can be explained by real economy factors: the terms of trade have deteriorated slightly due to falling prices on telecom products; exports have declined more heavily in Sweden than in many other countries following on from the economic slowdown in the USA; and a falling order intake for exports has created a declining demand for the krona. However, there are also other explanations that are not directly concerned with real economy factors, but have instead been steered by financial flows, i.e.
[12] Duncan Lamont, Apr 2018, Market views - What is the point of equity market [13] McKinsey Global Private Markets Review 2019, Private markets come of age [14] CFA Institute Mar 2019, MIFID II Research Unbundling: A Survey Yielding Mixed Results [15] This year, MATCH has been enhanced with a new “Deal Fridays” format, reflecting a joint partnership with Enterprise Singapore to connect a carefully curated list of growthstage ASEAN companies with investors through weekly investor-company match-making events. Since the launch of “Deal Fridays” in June 2019, over 400 companies and 400 investors have participated in Deal Fridays.

Given that the pace of the internationalisation of Islamic finance has accelerated during this period, it has heightened the urgency to chart the next phase of development of Islamic finance to ensure that financial stability continues to be preserved and that the financial system continues to serve the economy. Its resilience during the global financial crisis should not result in complacency. As we move forward, there are three key imperatives in addition to the efforts to ensure financial stability for the industry and to the continued development of the financial system. BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  First is the need to highlight with greater clarity the value proposition of Islamic finance so as to ensure that it remains a form of financial intermediation that serves the real economy and that it will continue to be a benefit to society. This requires the development of financial products and services that manifests the value propositions of Islamic finance, and that such products are marketed with simplicity so as to facilitate a greater understanding of the main benefits of the products. In relation to this, Islamic finance presents significant appeal to the growing Socially Responsible Investment (SRI), sustainable investments and ethical finance. This is particularly relevant in the context of the recent global financial crisis. It has brought to the forefront the need for the financial system to be linked to the economy and for the need for greater and improved levels of transparency, fairness, ethics and social responsibility in modern finance.
We have also faced several challenges at home, which include two episodes of the avian flu and a decline in consumer and investor sentiment linked to the situation in the South. But despite these risks and challenges, the Thai economy has managed quite well under the circumstances. The latest data showed real GDP to have grown by an impressive 6.4 percent for the first half of this year, reflecting the resiliency of our economy, which is still growing at a respectable rate, in spite of many negative external developments. Favourable conditions for the export of goods and services have allowed a continued surplus of our current account. This has been accompanied by corresponding reductions in external debt which fell from the peak of 112 billion US dollars in June 1997 to 50 billion US dollars in June of this year. Meanwhile, international reserves of 44 billion US dollars in August also provide a level of protection that should help the economy comfortably absorb external shocks. It was mainly an account of the strength of this external position that Thailand’s credit rating was upgraded by Standard and Poor’s last month. Ladies and gentlemen, At this time, the high price of oil is probably the most important external risk to the economy. However, this risk poses varying implications for economic growth and stability. Our macroeconomic forecasting model shows that the impact of higher oil price on economic growth is likely to be less pronounced compared to its impact on inflation and economic stability.

8  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches  8  EMBARGO: not for release before 19:30 on Wednesday 4 October 2017  Further ahead, we hope for a strong, co-operative relationship in which wholesale banks can continue to operate across the UK and EU27 in branches. The fact this happens today is not just thanks to the passport. It is because we have shared in the long road of post-crisis reform, developing and implementing the same high standards. And it is because we have embedded a sophisticated framework of supervisory co-operation, toward the same objectives of safety and soundness. With common interests and a concerted effort, there is every reason to think these will continue into the future. But we must plan, in a proportionate way, for alternative outcomes. Planning for the worst, hoping for the best. Conclusion  In my speech here a year ago, I said that the post-crisis reforms will be treated to revisionist history and the calls of counter-revolution. So it has proved, most obviously in the US. Some still argue that capital requirements are too high, and others that they are too low. Broadly I think we have landed in the right place and I take some comfort from being flanked on both sides of the argument. The next challenge will be striking the right balance of geofinance. How much is enough? Learning the lessons of the past decade, we are embracing geofinance in the domestication of retail banking.