samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
Three short-term concrete measures Now, I would like to share three initiatives that the Banque de France is striving to encourage: 1) Promoting a homogeneous approach to conducting penetration tests among various players in the financial sector. From this perspective, the TIBER-EU framework that the ECB provided earlier this year is a tool that would be helpful to implement in order to test the resilience of the financial system and especially the capacity of cross-border companies. In this respect, TIBER-EU will have to be rolled out at the national level, especially for testing market infrastructures, while taking into account specific local aspects and respecting core requirements in terms of responsibilities, risk management and the conduct of the tests. Through “coordinated frameworks” it will therefore be possible to achieve the much-needed harmonisation of practices and a mutual recognition of tests across the European Union. 2) Carrying out simulation exercises in the particular context of extreme but plausible cyber-attack scenarios, possibly including cross-border exercises. Against the backdrop of the rising number of cyber-attacks in the financial sector, there is a need to supplement on-site and off-site supervision, beyond merely conducting response exercises at domestic level, and possibly even across many countries at the same time. The G-7 has given priority to the enhancement of cross-border coordination in the event of a significant cyber incident: the Banque de France chairs the sub-group in charge of preparing and performing this exercise in 2019.

With more than 2,500 Indian companies, 2,300 Chinese companies, and 2,000 Australian and New Zealand companies in Singapore, corporates have made Singapore their location of choice to tap into this growth. However, Singapore’s value transcends our physical proximity to the fastest growing regions of the world. Indeed, Daiwa’s extensive commitments and new activities in Singapore is the best testament of our successful efforts to create the best possible business environment. It highlights recognition of our stable and trusted environment, supported by reliable infrastructure, highly educated workforce and consistent and transparent government policies. To further enlarge the market, Singapore has forged important linkages to the rest of the world. We have built up a network of Free Trade Agreements with many of our key trading partners such as Japan, the US, India and Korea. Discussions are ongoing with the Gulf region and China for greater market access for Singapore-based entities. A Connectivity Agreement between Singapore and Vietnam will amongst others, deepen collaboration in financial services, and promises greater opportunities for businesses from both countries. Conclusion On this note, I would like to convey my heartiest congratulations to Daiwa Securities Group on your 35th anniversary in Singapore. The future of the region continues to shine bright and I encourage all to leverage on Singapore to tap into the region’s growth. I wish everyone a wonderful evening ahead. Thank you. 2  BIS Review 72/2007
BIS Review 45/2010  Central to a honest self-evaluation of the role played by monetary policy is our adoption of a “real-time” perspective. The benefits of hindsight are enormous – but also potentially misleading. If we had known ahead of time that Lehman Brothers would fail in September 2008, we would no doubt have taken different policy decisions in the preceding months. But such considerations are not a meaningful guide to future policy. By their nature, economic “shocks” cannot be foreseen. Taking these aspects into account, it would be a mistake to think that the way monetary policy was conducted did not play any role in the outbreak of the financial crisis. Monetary policy can actually be considered one of the factors that, in some countries, contributed to the crisis, at least to the extent that it was too accommodative to maintain price stability. The overly loose global monetary policy may have weakened the anchoring of price stability and at the same time unleashed a wave of euphoria and excessive risk-taking in the financial sector. It would be a waste if this financial crisis did not give us the opportunity to think deeply about the framework for monetary policy-making – the objective of policy; the models underpinning our analysis; and the indicators on which we focus when taking policy decisions. Even if excessively loose monetary policy is only partly to blame for the financial crisis, a case can be made that it fuelled the accumulation of financial imbalances that underlay the crisis.

“The post-crisis fix: Regulatory or monetary policy remedies?” paper presented at the Reserve Bank of India’s First International Research Conference (February); P. De Grauwe and D. Gros (2009), “A new two-pillar strategy for the ECB”, CEPS policy brief no.191. 8  See: O. Blanchard, G. Dell’Ariccia and P. Mauro (2010). “Rethinking macroeconomic policy”, IMF staff position note no. 10/03 http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/spn/2010/spn1003.pdf. 4  BIS Review 45/2010  by most leading central banks. At the ECB, we are fortunate that the primacy of price stability has been made explicit. With this in mind, it is difficult to attribute any pre-crisis “policy error” to the pursuit of the wrong monetary policy objective. Nonetheless, we are already witnessing the emergence of siren calls to change the objective – in particular, for monetary policy to target a higher steady-state inflation rate, difficult to reconcile with price stability. These calls must be resisted. Emphasising the primacy of price stability objective over the medium term does not imply central bankers should be, in the words of Mervyn King, “inflation nutters”. 9 Using Theil’s framework to characterise the monetary policy problem also helps to clarify its dynamic nature. Recognising the long and variable lags in the transmission of monetary policy and the inevitability of short-term shocks to price dynamics, policy-makers need to adopt a mediumterm orientation in their decisions. Attempts to fine-tune price developments on a short-term basis are doomed to failure.
The work on oversight and crisis management The Riksbank presents its analysis of system stability every six months in the Financial Stability Report. The Report basically aims to provide a picture of the Swedish banks’ ability to stand up to any disruptions. The purpose is to identify conceivable risks and present a sound analysis that influences the market’s participants. The task of the Riksbank can perhaps be described as to keep cool and restrain undue optimism when there seem to be no problems in an upward phase, and to fill in the picture, if necessary, in a downward phase to allay concern about serious loan losses. The analysis concentrates on the four major Swedish banks because their size makes it likely that they are relevant for system stability. The failure of one of these banks might jeopardise stability, though this is by no means certain. The durability of the banks is dependent on a number of factors. The Riksbank analyses the main categories of borrower, developments in the bank groups and the financial infrastructure. Borrowers are analysed in terms of the corporate and household sectors in general, with particular reference to levels of debt and the future ability to pay. The real-estate sector is considered separately because the companies here account for as much as one-third of the banks’ corporate lending. The prices of commercial properties and private housing are also analysed because they reflect the value of the collateral that is pledged for loans from banks and mortgage institutions.

In the upward phase, obtaining financing is easy and cheap, while it is harder and more expensive in the downward phase. Sometimes, the upturn in the financial cycle results in a financial crisis, but not always. The difference in the time horizon between the regular business cycle and the financial cycle gives rise to conflicting objectives for the central bank. When the cycles head in different directions, there may be a trade-off between price stability and resource utilisation in the short term, and financial stability in the longer term. If a financial crisis actually occurs it will of course have repercussions on both inflation and resource utilization. The trade-off is particularly severe if the central bank only has the policy rate at its disposal. In the Swedish economy, we currently have a low inflation rate and relatively weak resource utilisation, while at the same time credit volumes have been increasing relatively sharply for a long time. There is therefore a trade-off between price stability and normal resource utilisation in the short term, and financial stability in the slightly longer term. For a central bank with only the policy rate at its disposal it is a case of balancing a poorer inflation and resource utilisation outcome in the short term against uncertain but very severe outcomes in the longer term. In such a situation, more expansive monetary policy can provide better fulfilment of inflation and resource utilisation objectives in the short term.
Scenarios however, are not projections, predictions or preferences but rather it provides a way of making sense of uncertainties and in addition it challenges our assumptions about what the future holds. Scenario building today is synonymous with thinking broadly and more freely about a problem, enlarging the frames of reference and involving different worldviews, rather than seeing a situation from a single perspective. Essentially scenario planning interventions have been most useful in supporting the construction of multiple frames of future states of possibilities. The process of scenario planning enhances the evaluation and integration of information and promotes contingency planning. Scenarios are also important for risk management. As risk is inherent in any business activity the framework becomes a useful tool in risk assessment and management. Most of all a major risk in the current environment is the lack of preparedness for how the environment might change and for the new challenges that may emerge. To attempt to predict these changes in any specific manner in this environment would be highly speculative. The risk management process therefore involves preparing for, rather than attempting to predict the change. This would promote an increased level of preparedness to cope with the inevitable changes. Scenarios also help to connect strategies and action plans to our visions. Using scenarios will essentially widen our perspectives, increase our understanding of the issues and developments. It also allows us to see opportunities that we may otherwise miss. New developments emerging would be seen from different angles and perspectives.

The framework thus promotes a greater awareness and appreciation of the wider range of issues and will allow the potential to see things earlier and thereby respond to them more promptly. Thus, embedding scenario analysis and planning in our organizational activities is aimed at enhancing the potential for the organization to successfully maximize its position in a rapidly changing and highly uncertain environment. Ladies and Gentlemen, This seminar is part of ICLIF's skills building and knowledge sharing initiatives. Our ultimate aim is to create a critical mass of high calibre leaders who can bring their organizations from good to great. Dr. Robert Bood and Mr. Ronald Bradfield, the two domain experts who have been conducting Scenario Thinking and Planning Programme for ICLIF, will shed more light on these areas in the course of the seminar. We hope you will benefit from the session, I wish you a productive and successful seminar. Thank you. BIS Review 93/2006  1
Effective management of the credit risks of banks and determining how much capital must be held against contingencies that could arise from such risks are very important for the soundness and stability of the banking sector. The 1988 Basle Capital Accord that I mentioned earlier was the fruit of the work directed to this aim. The Accord targets a bank’s capital holdings as a proportion of the credit risk of their onbalance-sheet and off-balance-sheet business. For this purpose, investment instruments were classified into five main categories according to their risk, and a risk coefficient assigned to each group. The weighting formula for asset risk was intended to determine the capital coverage needed for a bank’s exposure to credit risk. But this arrangement dating from 1988 proved ineffective against newer developments emerging during the last decade, and work continues particularly at the BIS on how to reduce credit risk. Besides credit risk, the main risk categories that have been identified in transactions and markets: such as Market risk, Exchange rate risk, Interest rate risk, Liquidity risk, Operational risk, Country risk, Legal risk, Hedging risk, Systemic risk. I do not intend to go into the details of all these categories of risk. Of special interest, however, is the improvement of systems and techniques that aim; to reduce these risks by means of information technology. Once the risk is identified, measuring it accurately is generally accepted as the next step in  3  BIS Review 41/1999  preventing it from happening.

Protectionism Is Not the Answer Given these costs of global integration and more liberalized trade, what is the best path forward? Although protectionism can have a siren-like appeal because of its potential to provide short-term benefits to particular segments of the economy, in the longer term it would almost certainly be destructive. Countries need to compete better, not compete less. Trade barriers are a very expensive way to preserve jobs in less competitive or declining industries. They blunt opportunities in export industries and they reduce the affordability of goods and services to households. Indeed, such measures often backfire, resulting in harm to workers and diminished growth. A better course is to learn from our experience. From a U.S. standpoint, we should work to reduce remaining foreign trade restrictions that impair our ability to capitalize on our comparative advantages. For example, market access restrictions can mean that certain U.S. industries cannot realize their full potential. Similarly, weaknesses in the protection of intellectual property rights limit the ability of U.S. producers to realize the full returns from their investments. This lowers profits and diminishes incentives to grow the business and employ more workers. If we are going to enhance the benefits of free trade and better manage its costs, it is critical that we continue to strengthen the global rules-based system. On the positive side, I would point to the World Trade Organization’s Trade Facilitation Agreement, which addresses customs procedures and could reduce global trade costs significantly.
Against this background of uncertainty and shocks, and in order to reap all the benefits of the fantastic process of economic and financial globalisation, we are still facing two main challenges: First, we observe persistent financial instability of which the ICT and equity bubble is a striking example. What are the factors behind such developments and which avenues should we explore in order to mitigate financial instability? Second, we had to cope with repeated financial crises in emerging market economies since the early 80s. Our challenge is how to prevent such crises and, if they occur, how to ensure that effective and predictable methods for crisis resolution are available, and enforced. In my view, the new international financial architecture (understood broadly) should provide appropriate policy responses to both types of challenges. Of course, they are interlinked in many ways. For the sake of clarity, I will address these two types of issues separately. •  First, I would like to show that some by-products of financial integration may have had adverse effects on the stability and efficiency of the financial systems;  •  I will then try to put into perspective recent crises in emerging market economies. *  1. Some by-products of financial integration may have had adverse effects on the stability of mature financial systems  1.1.

The need for an enhanced framework for crisis prevention and management  I do not need to remind you of the long list of financial crises emerging market economies have gone through in the last two decades. Against this background, the international community must, on the one hand, enhance crisis prevention and, on the other hand, design and implement better procedures for crisis resolution. BIS Review 62/2002  3  2.1. Authorities must reflect, in conjunction with the financial industry, on building up a suitable system of surveillance and crisis prevention. The objective of strengthening crisis prevention is shared by the private sector and by official community given the magnitude of potential losses; indeed, in some cases, restructuring costs for banking crises have reached more than 40 % of GDP. Building on international standards and codes is instrumental in establishing an appropriate institutional, supervisory and regulatory framework in the financial sectors of all market economies. The value of international standards is now widely recognised, insofar as they contribute to spreading international best practices and codes of good conduct, very closely linked to the globalisation process and the expansion of international capital flows. Indeed, the conduct of sound national economic and financial policies stands for a primary protection against potential financial contagion. Much has already been achieved with the design of more than seventy internationally agreed norms.
The Federal Reserve has raised its key rate four times, by a total of 1 percentage point. The Bank of England has raised its key rate by 1 percentage point. In October, the People’s Bank of China raised its key rate for the first time in nine years. After rising sharply for several quarters, economic growth in the US slowed somewhat in the second and third quarters of 2004. Looking ahead, growth among our trading partners is projected to moderate, but resource utilisation is expected to increase gradually. Increased global activity has led to rising commodity prices. Oil prices are high. There are still expectations of an increase in international interest rates, but market participants have lowered their growth and interest rate expectations as a result of high oil prices. Growth in the Norwegian economy picked up during the second half of 2003. The low interest rate has contributed to strong growth in private consumption and housing investment. Activity has picked up in service industries and the construction sector. High petroleum investment, the global economic recovery and a weaker krone through 2003 have improved conditions for manufacturing. Profitability is improving for mainland enterprises. There are signs of renewed growth in investment in a number of industries. Imports have expanded markedly. Potential growth in the Norwegian economy is estimated to increase somewhat more than normal this year as a result of increased competition and rationalisation in many sectors.

This could in turn result in lower demand and lower commodity prices. High oil prices have mixed effects on the Norwegian economy. Lower demand abroad will have a negative impact on parts of the Norwegian economy. At the same time, domestic demand is normally stimulated by higher petroleum investment. The balance in the Norwegian foreign exchange market will not be affected to any appreciable extent. So far, the effects of high oil prices on developments in the real economy have been relatively limited. Credit developments in the past year have given ambiguous signals to our interest-rate setting. Growth in household debt is high. Enterprises have been reducing their debt for some time, but developments over the past months may suggest that this trend has been reversed. Norwegian enterprises and households borrow primarily at variable rates. Loans with no form of fixed rate agreement account for over 80 per cent of the value of loans to the household and enterprise sector. The current interest rate level is very low. Long-term investments cannot be made based on the assumption that this interest rate level will persist. According to money market expectations, the interest rate will eventually stabilise at close to 5½ per cent. This interest rate, plus a premium for banks’ margins, provides a more realistic indication of the interest rate level that will apply over the loan’s life than the variable interest rates prevailing today. Growth in the Norwegian economy is now solid. It appears that growth will also be high in 2005.
The major challenge for the future lies not in the number of jobs moving abroad, but in managing the transition required to make it possible to create new jobs as new employment is created mainly in other countries/regions. This requires a good corporate climate, a good capacity to attract knowledge and capital and an ability to transform, including flexibility in the labour market so that employees can apply to new sectors and areas as smoothly as possible. If this is not successful, there is a risk of growing structural unemployment. At the time of the extensive structural transformation in the 1970s, the public sector took in many of the new entrants on the labour market and those who lost their jobs. This possibility is no longer available to the same extent. Instead, it is the private service sector that will have to expand. In a sparsely-populated country like Sweden, however, labour market matching can be particularly problematic as many service companies require proximity to population centres in order to be profitable. A key issue in future will be how we can attract capital to invest in Sweden. Regarded in this perspective, the falling investment ratio in recent years provides cause for concern, although there was a recovery last year. Sweden currently has a large trade surplus, but many of the large Swedish companies choose to invest their export income abroad.

6 However, the expansion in exports in China has been made possible by the fact that production per worker has increased, rather than by a dramatic increase in the amount of labour. 7 The "supply shock” is the result of modernisation and industrialisation, i.e. that workers who are not very productive move from an old-fashioned structure of collective agriculture and state-owned companies to modern companies that produce goods for export. The effects of this development on the labour market and on real wages in the west will depend on how the exchange of various types of traded goods develops and how this in turn affects relative prices. Globalisation could certainly entail downward pressure on Swedish real wages, but both data and historical experiences so far indicate that this is not the case. At least, there is nothing in the statistics to indicate that there has been any deterioration in industrial nations’ trade conditions towards either China or other Asian countries. In the long term, Swedish and Chinese wages will probably converge, but this does not necessarily mean falling real wages in Sweden. It is particularly those with no higher education who risk experiencing pressure from the new industrial nations, but a general reduction in real wages does not appear very likely. Sweden has been exposed to international competition for a long time without suffering any deterioration in our welfare, and over the past 10 years we have had rising real wages, despite the expansion in China.