samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
The next sign will be the depletion of the capital base. In the current paper money systems with no backing of gold or foreign currency holdings, capital funds in a central bank serves to back the domestic asset creation. If the capital funds which are non-monetary liabilities are equal to the domestic assets (a hundred percent cover), then all monetary liabilities are backed by gross foreign assets similar to a currency board. Therefore, the auditors should look for the ratio of capital funds to domestic assets and if the ratio is above 100%, they could be complacent. However, the risk factor emerges if the ratio falls. The auditors should alert the central bank management and come to arrangement with it, to prevent its further depletion. If the ratio falls closer to 15%, the level prescribed in many central bank legislations as the minimum requirement, the auditors should issue a red alert to central bank managements. When the ratio falls below 15%, then, it is a matter of national emergency and urgent measures need be introduced to re-capitalise a central bank. The third sign is the actual losses made by central banks due to larger out-payments. The fourth sign is the necessity for issuing currency to finance a central bank’s affairs, since it amounts to inflating the economy to meet a central bank’s expenses. Conclusion The auditors of a modern central bank should play a different role today.

But it must be clear that beyond regulators and central banks, the private sector has also a key role to play to ensure that the digitalisation of finance indeed brings about the efficiency benefits it is expected to deliver without jeopardizing the stability of our financial system. From that perspective I would like to underline the strategic importance of the European Payments Initiative. 3/4  BIS central bankers' speeches  The EPI is currently the only project aiming to offer an integrated pan-European payment solution with a common brand, and not based on the interoperability of heterogeneous domestic solutions. I regret that part of the European banking community has prioritised other interests over a common, lasting project. This shrinking of the number of shareholders has inevitable consequences on the capacity of the initiative, leading EPI to give up on a European card scheme, and leaving this field open for international schemes in the short and medium term. On the other hand, we can also acknowledge that EPI has decided to invest in the next generation of payments: mobile, account-to-account and instant payments. Eight of the first ten European banks and the two largest European payment processors are part of the project. We therefore hope that the launch of the first EPI solutions, expected for the beginning of 2023, will convince other banking communities to join this new digital pan-European solution, which stands as a great chance for the European market to build the independence of the European payments market for the future.
As real convergence is progressively achieved and as structural reforms proceed, the case for a narrow band would also become stronger. Should this latter path be followed, the burden of adjustment to external shocks would, of course, have to be borne by the real economy. In the first instance, this means pursuing a prudent fiscal policy. The current aim of fiscal policy is indeed to reduce the deficit to GDP ratio to around 2.5% by 2004, from 5.3% last year and over 10% in the late 1990s. By restraining domestic absorption, tighter fiscal policy should enhance the credibility of the exchange rate peg. Moreover, a smaller borrowing requirement also frees up resources for the private sector and helps to contain upward pressure on interest rates, thereby stimulating economic growth. Finally, bringing the budget deficit closer to balance will then give fiscal policy the leeway to respond in the event of adverse shocks or cyclical downturns. The response to shocks will also depend on the degree of flexibility in the economy as a whole. Unlike most accession countries, Malta has a long experience of a functioning market economy, driven by private ownership of productive assets and with much of it exposed to international competition. In general, therefore, the private sector has already proved that it can cope with adverse shocks. In this regard, the flexibility of the labour market has been especially important. This flexibility must, however, be enhanced in order to safeguard competitiveness.

While these ever emerging technologies such as Digital transformation, Artificial Intelligence, Internet of Things, Cloud Computing, Enterprise Mobility and Mobile Banking, have brought about efficiency and increased innovations, they have also exposed the financial services sector to cybercrime. Some notable incidents of 1|Page  cybercrime include, the attack on the Central Bank of Bangladesh, Russian retail bank and seven banks in the United Kingdom. The financial services sector is a key target by criminals because it is the custodian of large amount of funds in the economy. For this same reason, the financial services sector has to also deal with other types of risks, which among others include, fraud, extortion, money laundering, illicit financial flows, market manipulation, data theft, and currency attacks. With statistics showing an increase of cyber-attacks in the financial sector, the importance of ensuring that our institutions are cyber resilient cannot be over-emphasized. Ladies and gentlemen, the financial services sector has to see cybersecurity for what it is, a large scale operational risk deserving the utmost attention and thus develop the necessary systems and cultures throughout the sector to deal with this risk. Key to the development and operation of these systems and cultures is the need to nurture talent capable of addressing cyber security threats through prompt detection, investigation, reporting, prosecution and prevention. Distinguished participants, let me also emphasize that cyber risks should be viewed from an enterprise-wide perspective.
That means building institutional frameworks that make it easier to resist as the lies regain their seductive power. If we can, we will build True Finance, an enduring platform for strong, sustainable and balanced growth. Over the past decade, great strides have been made. Let me begin with the global reforms that have addressed the third lie that “markets are moral”. In the cycle of scandal, response, integrity, drift, and new scandal, potential solutions have oscillated between the extremes of Light Touch Regulation and Total Regulation. There are problems with each. By undervaluing the importance of hard and soft infrastructure to the functioning of real markets, light touch regulation led directly to the financial crisis.19  18  The scale of misconduct impaired banks’ ability to function fairly and effectively. Global banks’ misconduct costs have exceeded $ billion, capital that could otherwise have supported around $ trillion of lending to households and businesses. More worrying still, in a system where trust is fundamental, it ought to be of grave concern that only 20% of UK citizens now think that banks are well run, compared to 90% in the 1980s. 19 “Hard infrastructure” refers to the way in which markets are organised. “Soft infrastructure” refers to the standards and norms, including regulation, market standards and codes, by which markets operate. 6  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Pages/speeches/default.aspx  6  Market standards were poorly understood, often ignored and always lacked teeth.

Payments after the COVID crisis – emerging issues and challenges Speech given by Christina Segal-Knowles Executive Director Financial Market Infrastructure Directorate  Webinar: London School of Economics and Centre for Economic Policy Research 11 June 2020  I would like to thank Natalia Dobrovolschi, Rachel James, Cordelia Kafetz, Hardeep Rai, Josh Sadler, Jonathan Wakefield, and Ellen Caswell for their assistance with preparing this speech and Laura Wallis and Stephanie Haffner for their comments and input. 1  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/speeches  Thanks Erik and thanks very much for inviting me to this webinar. I’ll talk through very briefly how payments were changing well before COVID-19 and the impact we’ve seen during the global health crisis. And then I’ll begin to cover what central banks can and are doing in response. Even before the current crisis, people were changing the way they pay. For many if not all of you– the fact that the way we pay has been changing significantly won’t be a surprise. You’ve experienced this. In London, where I live and work, contactless payments have become ubiquitous – from small coffee shops, to farmer’s markets, to stalls at sporting and music events, the need to rush to the cash machine is gone - you can tap your card, phone or watch. We’ve become accustomed to online baskets and clicks; to summoning and paying for services on our phone. People’s behaviour has changed.
Mr. George looks at the prospects for the City of London - in or out of EMU Speech by the Governor of the Bank of England, Mr. E.A.J.George, at the Royal Institute of International Affairs Conference in London, on 24/10/97. Prospects for the City -- in or out of EMU Mr. Chairman, you have asked me to speak specifically about “the prospects for the City - or out of EMU”. You -- very kindly in recent circumstances -- did not ask me to discuss the wider pros and cons, either of the project as a whole, or of UK membership. But perhaps I might nevertheless begin by making a more general point. Perfectly reasonable people can legitimately disagree about EMU, both in principle and about the appropriate timing and pace of monetary integration. On the project as a whole, most analysts would acknowledge that there are real potential benefits, but that there are also real risks to be set against them; and most would acknowledge that those risks will increase if the politics of EMU are allowed to run ahead of the economics, so that countries are allowed, or even encouraged, to participate, without first having achieved genuine, and sustainable, economic convergence -- in substance and not just some technical accounting form. On the question of British membership the new Labour Government has spoken of ‘formidable obstacles’ to this country joining EMU in the first wave.

In addition to making our own internal preparations at the Bank, we play a co-ordinating role in the financial community in three main ways: First, our job is to ensure that the necessary infrastructure is developed in the UK to allow anyone who wishes to do so to use the euro in wholesale payments and across the financial markets in London from the first day of EMU. Second, we aim to promote discussion between the EMI, national central banks and market participants across Europe about practical issues on which the market is seeking a degree of co-ordination. And third, we provide information: for example, through our quarterly series of editions on Practical Issues Arising from the Introduction of the Euro, which is distributed to around 32,000 BIS Review 106/1997  -4recipients across the City and beyond, including 4,000 directly abroad. And following the successful symposium we held early this year, we are planning to hold a further symposium, next January at the Bank, on London as the international financial centre for the euro. Our theme will be: ‘London will be ready’. I shall now turn to the steps that we are taking to ensure that London will be ready for the euro, whether the UK is “in” or “out”. (i) Payments and settlement infrastructure for the euro First of all, the payments and settlement infrastructure. We are constructing payments arrangements in euro in London which we intend to be at least as efficient and cheap as anywhere else in Europe, even if the UK stays “out”.
The national central banks will purchase the bonds issued by European institutions and most of the domestic bonds, the ECB purchasing 8% of the latter. According to our preliminary estimates, the purchases of Spanish government debt will amount to some € billion over the time horizon considered. The agreement reached means that, in the hypothetical event that losses arise from these operations, the national central banks would assume the risks of their purchases of government bonds, while the risk of the purchases of the bonds of European institutions and of sovereign bonds by the ECB would be shared by all the members of the Eurosystem. Monetary policy leeway in a very low inflation environment Let me now comment briefly on two matters of importance in the current context: the leeway available to monetary policy in a very low inflation environment and the different cyclical moment of monetary policy in the main developed economies. The particularly low inflation rates and the prospect that they will remain at similar levels for a prolonged period reduce the scope for monetary policy to bring the financing conditions of the economy into line with its cyclical position when that position is characterised by notable weakness. Conventional monetary policies based on setting short-term nominal interest rates reach their lower bound when rates approach 0%.

It has issued consumer guides and organized public seminars to educate consumers on fire insurance, property insurance, health insurance and motor insurance under the MoneySENSE national financial education programme. There is, however, more to be done. As Mr Teo mentioned earlier, general insurance penetration remains low in Singapore. Insurance density, measured by gross premiums as a percentage of GDP, rose from 1.0% in 2000 to 1.5% in 2005, but this is still lower than the 1.8% in Malaysia, 1.6% in Thailand, 2.9% in Taiwan and 3.0% in South Korea. When compared against developed countries like UK and Switzerland, which reported insurance densities of between 3.5% and 5.0%, we are much further behind. There is therefore significant room for the industry to grow. It would be worthwhile for GIA to focus on improving insurance penetration in Singapore by identifying insurance lines that have greater prospects for growth. MAS’ supervisory approach MAS believes that there should be a constructive partnership between the regulator and the industry. On our part, we will continue to fine tune our supervisory approach to support the growth of the industry. Competition is a necessary ingredient for growth, but there are many areas where the industry can work together. In particular, the industry should work together to promote best practices in risk management and professional standards. MAS will continue to support efforts by the industry to promote sustainable and healthy growth by maintaining an appropriate regulatory framework that recognises innovation.
But, more than this, we should explore the possibilities to give greater feed-back to reporting institutions, from which they can derive benefits. 5  Taking advantage of new technologies  The final element that I want to mention today is certainly not the least important. I believe that we should make full use of the possibilities offered by new technologies and tools to collect, transmit, manage and analyse the increasing amounts of data we are faced with. A standard like XBRL can and should play a central role in enhancing information flows. Its great advantage is that it allows for a more precise, reliable and rapid interface between the generators and users of information. But XBRL is not only a tool for transmission of data. Through the development of “taxonomies” or dictionaries of terms, it allows information to be generated and interpreted on a consistent basis. XBRL  4  BIS Review 47/2006  therefore means that financial information from entities can be understood and assimilated in other parts of the world in an accurate and timely manner. In the banking sector, XBRL could be a means of finding a common language for financial information needs. It could thereby facilitate supervisory co-operation and promote a level playing field. It is for these reasons that CEBS has decided to promote the use of XBRL in the two common reporting initiatives that I mentioned earlier in my intervention.

In my view, a greater degree of convergence in the underlying regulation which applies to financial institutions and markets will provide us with an excellent basis for making progress on other aspects. Let me refer to some initiatives that have been taken in this respect. Of course, the first initiative that I must mention is that of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). Given the importance of accounting data as the basis of information flows, the development and application of these standards is providing a valuable opportunity to enhance the efficiency and comparability of information, especially on an international basis. Indeed, with effect from 1 January 2005, all EU listed companies have been required by law to use IFRS for their consolidated financial statements. The significance of this development should not be underestimated. It means that market participants and other interested parties should be able to compare and contrast information relating to companies in different jurisdictions on a like-for-like basis, and thereby make more informed decisions. Common accounting standards increase transparency and comparability for investors, thus promoting greater cross border investment. And let me give you a less direct, but nonetheless important example of a regulatory convergence initiative, from my perspective as Chairman of the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision. As you may well be aware, at the end of the nineties, we embarked on a review of the so-called “Basel Accord”, an agreement reached back in 1988 to determine minimum regulatory capital requirements for international banks.
Jon Cunliffe: Is the world financial system safer now? Speech by Sir Jon Cunliffe, Deputy Governor for Financial Stability of the Bank of England, at the Chatham House City Series conference on Global Financial Markets: new rules on market structure, trading and funding, London, 17 March 2014. * I. *  *  Introduction  On 17 November 2008, for the first time ever, the leaders of the G20 came together to try to find a way through the worst economic and financial crisis since the 1930s. As I sat there, in Washington, in the National Building Museum, Benjamin Franklin’s famous warning came to mind: “If we do not hang together, most assuredly we will hang separately”. That Washington summit, and the ones in London and Pittsburgh that followed in quick succession, were extraordinary in many ways. Most striking, there was no rancour, no finger pointing between the leaders of the G20. Rather, the dominant mood was that we were indeed “all in it together”, or in Franklin’s words, would hang separately if we did not hang together. And, in contrast to the familiar run of Summits and Councils and international meetings, from the outset, there was a powerful bias to action: “what can we do to counter this crisis?” And, also from the outset, “how do we make sure it cannot happen again?” History has already started arguing about whose idea that first G20 summit was.

Third, getting a handle on – and where necessary – regulating, the risks in the so called “shadow banking” system: the ecosystem of non-bank financial firms that perform a similar role in credit intermediation to that played by the banking sector. And fourth, and perhaps most important, making sure that no institution, no matter how large, how complex, how international in its activities or to put it simply, no matter how systemic, is “too big to be allowed to fail”. Because if financial institutions can make themselves too big to fail, if they can ensure that if and when they get into trouble the taxpayer will have no option but to bail them out if, as the economists put it, they can ensure that their profits and their pay are private but if it all goes wrong the losses are “socialised” then history teaches us that this is exactly what they will do. III. What has been achieved? So, in these four key areas, what has been achieved? The inputs have certainly been impressive. From a standing start in 2009 the Financial Stability Board has driven the regulatory reform programme. Under the FSB, around 25 groups have been set up to run around 15 major workstreams.
The need for further fiscal adjustment is clearly emphasized in the latest available IMF country reports. The screening shows that with exception of two countries (Romania and Lithuania) all the countries should adjust further. According to the IMF, most of the countries are in the so-called group of "strong adjustors"7. This means that the governments should have a very "ambitious" agenda, or have to significantly shrink the primary deficit in order to ensure fiscal sustainability. Expectedly, the most indebted countries are amongst the ones where the strongest downward adjustment is envisaged, such as Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia and Albania. However, even if they pursue their consolidation plans, some of them will still have vulnerable position as the debt level will be higher then what the Maastricht criteria prescribes (60% of GDP) - chart 13 lower right and left quadrant. Further fiscal consolidation against the background of still "anemic" economic activity and rising interest rates may be very challenging. 7  Authors’ definition, presented on chart 13. Chart 13: Size of fiscal adjustment -2021-2015*  Debt change and distance from the Maastricht Criteria 60% of GDP** -40  Cumulative change of primary deficit (in p.p.)

Philipp M Hildebrand: Monetary policy situation and economic prospects Summary of a speech by Dr Philipp M Hildebrand, Member of the Governing Board of the Swiss National Bank, at the Centre for Banking Studies, Lugano, 28 September 2004. The complete speech can be found in French on the Swiss National Bank’s website (www.snb.ch). *  *  *  In formulating its medium-term monetary policy, the Swiss National Bank (SNB) must take the uncertainty surrounding the development of the economic environment into consideration. The SNB believes that the economy is well on the road to recovery, both in Switzerland and abroad. For our country, it anticipates real GDP growth of close to 2% in 2004. Sustained growth is also expected for the coming years. Consequently, the utilisation of the economy’s production capacity will steadily improve, while unemployment will gradually decline. The improved utilisation rate will be accompanied by a rise in inflationary pressure in the medium term. This scenario could be revised, however, if new information were to come to light. The SNB will thus continue to monitor economic developments closely and will subsequently draw the necessary monetary policy conclusions. BIS Review 54/2004  1