samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
Abdul Rasheed Ghaffour: Islamic finance – building solutions for a sustainable future Speech by Mr Abdul Rasheed Ghaffour, Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Malaysia (Bank Negara Malaysia), at the 3rd Annual Symposium on Islamic Finance "Islamic Finance - Building Solutions for a Sustainable Future", Kuala Lumpur, 12 December 2017. * * * It is an honour for me to be here today at this 3rd Annual Symposium on Islamic Finance. We are gathered here to engage and affirm our vision towards realising the potential of Islamic finance in supporting the Sustainable Development Goals that form the new global development blueprint. Time is of the essence in meeting the goals and targets by 2030. We have to collectively strategise our actions to bring them to life. How we balance economic prosperity, social equity and environmental responsibility matters greatly to the world. It is without a doubt that we cannot have continued prosperity without sustainability. In my remarks this morning, I will touch on the current global economic environment and challenges facing the world that point to the need for us to promote fiscal, social and environmental sustainability. I will also discuss the imperatives that can strengthen the role of Islamic finance in promoting inclusive growth, reducing inequality and accelerating poverty reduction. The past 50 years has been a period of extraordinary global economic expansion. The world economy expanded sixfold and average per capita income nearly tripled.

Over the past two decades, there has been a significant change in the financing of higher education—with state and local funding covering a smaller share, and students and their families bearing a greater proportion of rising college costs. While the federal student loan program has undoubtedly helped mitigate the impact of higher costs on college enrollment, more students now leave college with higher amounts of debt. At the same time, college dropout rates remain stubbornly high, and empirical evidence indicates that graduates from some colleges have had trouble finding good-paying jobs. Another important question concerns the consequences of growing student debt for the overall economy. To investigate this question further, we linked our CCP dataset to student enrollment records from the National Student Clearinghouse in order to analyze the relationship between homeownership, educational attainment and student debt. Not surprisingly, our research shows a strong positive association between educational attainment and homeownership, consistent with the fact that higher educational attainment is associated with higher average earnings. Interestingly, this relationship appears to hold irrespective of family background, suggesting that colleges may be successful in “leveling the playing field” across students from different socioeconomic backgrounds. At the same time, our analysis reveals that those with significant student debt are much less likely to own a home at any given age than those who completed their education with little or no student debt.
The invisible hand of the carbon price incentivises and coordinates emissions-reduction efforts in ways that regulation cannot achieve. While carbon pricing has gained traction globally, it needs to be higher and applied more broadly. The right price of carbon is the social cost it imposes on the environment. According to the World Bank, less than 5% of the emissions covered by a carbon pricing initiative are priced at a level consistent with achieving the goals of the Paris Agreement, namely $ per tonne of carbon dioxide by 2020 and $ per tonne by 2030. The idea of a federal carbon tax remains political anathema in the United States. Even the European Emissions Trading System currently covers only about 50% of the EU’s greenhouse gas emissions and gives many allowances for free. Singapore will progressively raise its carbon taxes from 2024. The current level of $ per tonne of CO2 equivalent will be raised to $ per tonne in 2024 and 2025, and $ in 2026 and 2027, with a view to reaching $ by 2030. This translates to a carbon price of roughly $ per tonne of CO2 equivalent in 2030. It is somewhat below the $ estimated by the World Bank of what a net-zero consistent price of carbon should be in 2030 but Singapore’s carbon tax covers about 80% of our national greenhouse gas emissions, much broader than in most countries. Singapore is also progressive in having a long tradition of high petrol taxes and no subsidies for fuel or electricity.

Unfortunately, these productivity figures are not the outcome of genuine improvements in the efficiency of productive processes, meaning they will hardly be sustainable in the medium term. The fact that labour costs are still growing at a high rate in this situation (on National Accounts figures wages increased by 4.6% in the second quarter of 2009) while employment  BIS Review 124/2009  3  was declining at a rate of over 7% and inflation was negative, reveals once more the persistence of serious inefficiencies in the behaviour of our labour market. The outlook for the Spanish economy remains highly uncertain, albeit less so in recent months in light of the likely recovery in the world economy in 2010. The Spanish economy will probably continue posting declines in output in the second half of this year, in contrast to the modest pick-up in activity expected in the euro area. Bearing on this different behaviour will be the marked weakness of investment, not only in the case of housing, given the supply overhang, but also probably in that of corporate investment, since low capacity utilisation allows increases in demand to be addressed without having to undertake new investment projects. Nor will it seem feasible to increase public investment in 2010, following the intense effort made in 2009, linked largely to the above-mentioned Local Investment Fund for Employment. How private consumption will fare is much more difficult to predict.
Engaging a broader set of perspectives across operations, legal, and compliance professionals – as well as individuals across buy-side, sell-side, and various market infrastructure firms – will help the Committee to apply this more comprehensive perspective to its work on best practices. It will take some time for these changes to be fully  11  See http://www.bis.org/review/r150213c.htm. 12  See http://www.newyorkfed.org/fxc/FXC_Charter_2015.pdf. 6  BIS central bankers’ speeches  implemented, but it is expected that the various steps that move us in this direction will also help us to engage even more effectively in the important work ahead. Global best practices efforts The FXC has been engaged in two global efforts with its counterparts abroad: development of the Global Preamble and work, now under way, to extend the Global Preamble into a single global code of best practices in the FX market. The Global Preamble (“Preamble”) is a document that was developed collaboratively by the eight central-bank-sponsored foreign exchange committees to provide a common basis from which our individual codes of conduct for the FX market follow. The Preamble lays out key, shared principles that underpin our respective codes. The publication of a revised Global Preamble earlier this year was an important development that built upon a tradition of increasing engagement across the committees. The initial Global Preamble was published in 2013 and marked the first time the committees had come together to provide a single voice around best practices.

William C Dudley: Remarks at the Regional Employment Press Briefing Remarks by Mr William C Dudley, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, at the 2010 Regional Employment Press Briefing, New York, 14 April 2010. *  *  *  Good morning and welcome to the New York Fed’s 2010 Regional Employment Press Briefing. The past few years have been an extraordinary time for policymakers. We have been very aggressive in providing support to the economy and it now appears that we are emerging from a deep and protracted recession. Economic activity expanded over the second half of 2009, suggesting that a recovery has begun. While we continue to receive encouraging news, growth is likely to be muted compared with the early stages of past recoveries. As a result, the unemployment rate is likely to decline over the near term at a very gradual pace, if at all. In the labor market, employment has begun to expand. We hope this is the beginning of a sustained period of job growth. Total employment shrank by roughly 8 million jobs since the peak of the cycle, and the current unemployment rate of 9.7 percent remains unacceptably high. At the regional level, here in the New York-New Jersey region, the labor market was not hit as hard as in many areas in the country, and the pace of job losses in our region has eased.
This is understandable considering the fact that the latest empirical research confirms the positive influence of the transfer from currency to electronic payment instruments on consumption, trade and economic growth, with the effects of card usage being the greatest, compared to other payment instruments1. Third, besides novelties in the field of payments, this conference traditionally includes the trends in securities settlement systems. Therefore, the discussions will be aimed towards the implementation of the “TARGET2 Securities” project, which is expected to facilitate realtime cross-border settlement of transactions in securities on the “delivery versus payment” principle, by integrating transaction accounts and securities accounts on a single platform. This project is aimed towards strengthening the integration of the financial market infrastructure, which is expected to contribute towards increasing competition, lower costs for settlement and greater financial stability. Discussions related to this topic will also include the latest trends in collateral and liquidity management taking into account the latest changes in the monetary policy setup in the euro area. Fourth, this conference will especially focus on the novelties in the proposed revision of the Payment Services Directive. The proposed amendments to the directive aim towards increasing the competition in the field of online payments related to e-commerce, by removing the barriers that the interested providers of these services face to enter the common market of the European Union, reducing the costs for the consumers when conducting card payments, as well as by raising the security level for online payments.

The Migration of credit transfers and direct debits under the SEPA requirements, will not resolve all payment-related issues which will be on the agenda of the Euro Retail Payments Board. Because of that, the Board is expected to  1  2  Hasan, I., Renzis, D. T. & Schmiedel, H. (2013) Retail Payments and the Real Economy. European Central Bank Working Paper No. 1572. BIS central bankers’ speeches  intensify its efforts for further integration in the field of card payments, innovations and security. Seventh, during the course of this conference we will also discuss virtual currencies, taking into account the public interest about the effects that these currencies have on the payments. Although these currencies are not economically significant and therefore, do not pose a risk to the price and financial stability, they do however pose significant risks to the individual users of the currencies. These risks, however, could impair the reputation of central banks given the fact that virtual currency schemes operate as retail payment systems, but are not regulated and monitored. Please allow me to briefly conclude that this conference on payment and security settlement systems has grown into a platform of active cooperation between the central banks, both in our region and beyond, in Europe, and we hope to continue hosting it in the future to assure faster and complete integration in the European Union.
And while they may remove the reliance on expert judgement, they veneer over the fundamental challenges of thin and incomplete markets through the extrapolation of data. The ability of such rates to maintain representativeness through periods of stress remains a challenge to which we have not seen adequate answers. Developments in sterling markets So what is the position in sterling markets? Back in 2017, a reformed SONIA rate was recommended by the Working Group on Sterling Risk-Free Reference Rates (RFRWG) as the alternative risk-free reference rate to sterling  Descending safely: Life after Libor ‐ speech by Andrew Bailey | Bank of England  Page 2  Libor. This was in my view a good choice reflecting the liquid and active markets upon which it is based. This makes it inherently more robust. Since then, the RFRWG and UK authorities have co-operated on recommending a series of industry milestones to build liquidity in SONIA. These milestones have been positioned ahead of the cessation of sterling Libor at the end of this year. We don’t apologise for this – it is focussing attention, and providing a clear roadmap to support the development of deep and liquid markets in robust alternatives to Libor and facilitating a smooth transition. In line with the RFRWG milestones, alternatives to GBP Libor should have been offered to borrowers since the start of October last year.

It is easy to understand why lenders may find credit sensitive alternatives attractive in the short-term, but what is less clear is why non-financial borrowers who look to their financial service providers to help them manage their risks would want to see their cost of borrowing being driven by thin liquidity in CP and CD markets. And it is clear they don’t, in a survey of borrowers by the Alternative Reference Committee’s Nonfinancial Corporates Working Group in March this year, over 80% of respondents would prefer alternatives based on SOFR than on credit sensitive alternatives. [16] In fact if lenders looked past the short term benefits of substitutability they too would see that when  Descending safely: Life after Libor ‐ speech by Andrew Bailey | Bank of England  Page 5  the limited durability of these credit sensitive rates is combined with the need, and in some jurisdictions the requirement, to ensure there is access to robust fallbacks the sensible option is to make your primary rate selection the most robust you can. In the UK there is a clear consensus that credit sensitive rates are not required or wanted as part of sterling LIBOR transition and in my view this is sensible. Widespread use of RFRs will ensure we are using benchmarks that will remain transparent to users and embed rates that have long-term durability for the future. Conclusion The use of SOFR in US dollar markets is growing.
They have also documented the substantial heterogeneity in the formation and updating of expectations across demographic groups. To facilitate further research, we make the survey data available in the Center for Microeconomic Data section of our website. Each month we also illustrate the trends in our expectations series through easy-to-use, interactive charts. Further, a number of our Liberty Street Economics blog posts describe the data and the analysis we have conducted. We do this because we want researchers, policymakers, commentators and the general public to understand the data and to follow our updates. Let me now describe our Survey of Consumer Expectations in more detail. 1/3  BIS central bankers' speeches  The Survey of Consumer Expectations Following extensive design and testing, we launched the Survey of Consumer Expectations in June 2013. The survey has a number of innovative and unique features, three of which I would like to highlight today. First and foremost, as I mentioned earlier, it collects households’ subjective expectations and intentions on a wide range of economic outcomes and behaviors. In addition to short- and medium-term inflation expectations, it collects data on households’ expectations regarding the housing, labor and credit markets, as well as households’ financial situations and a host of other macroeconomic variables of interest. For example, the survey elicits beliefs about future wage growth, house price appreciation, job search and labor market transitions, households’ spending and income growth, and credit applications.

Aggregate labor market statistics on earnings, employment and labor market transitions are readily available, yet relatively little is known about the expectations and search behaviors of labor market participants and how these change over time. Our SCE Labor Market Survey collects rich information on respondents’ actual and expected wage offers, as well as their reservation wage, which is the lowest wage or salary they say they would accept for a new job. We also elicit expectations about future labor market transitions, such as the likelihood of staying with the same employer, switching employers, finding a job or being laid off. Over time, changes in responses to these questions can shed light on how workers’ expectations evolve, and how these changes relate to observed trends in aggregate earnings and employment dynamics. Our preliminary analyses of the data suggest that these expectations measures are predictive of respondents’ subsequent labor market outcomes. In coming years, as we generate a longer time series for the survey, we will be able to explore whether the expectations we collect can be used to construct leading indicators of the job market. Now, I’d like to turn things over to our economists, beginning with Olivier Armantier, who will provide further background and specifics about our survey. 1 Olivier Armantier, Giorgio Topa, Joseph Tracy, Wilbert van der Klaauw and Basit Zafar assisted in preparing  these remarks. 3/3  BIS central bankers' speeches
A network of contacts has already been set up with the relevant central banks, and several bilateral as well as multilateral meetings at expert level have been convened in recent months. It goes without saying that these working relationships will be intensified over the coming months and years with a view to deepening such cooperation in areas of specific interest to the Eurosystem. In this regard, for example, a high-level meeting with the central banks of the accession countries will be held in Helsinki as early as next month. Since the successful integration of the accession countries into the euro area will ultimately depend on the policy strategies which they adopt, the Eurosystem is already taking a particular interest in these strategies. In this regard, it is quite encouraging that, in most cases, the monetary policies pursued are increasingly similar to those of the Eurosystem. First, they aim at achieving and maintaining price stability by supporting a disinflation process which is in some cases already fairly advanced, even if performance generally still remains out of line with EMU standards. And second, their strategies are increasingly based upon the process of using indirect and market-based instruments to control the degree of liquidity of the banking system. More precisely, these strategies include the use of standing facilities, repurchase agreements and other open market operations, and deposit reserve requirements. With regard to exchange rate policy, the accession countries currently pursue a variety of strategies.

This is in the interest of the countries which have already introduced the euro, but even more so in the interest of new countries entering the euro area. Without having achieved sustainable convergence, the loss of the exchange rate and interest rate instrument could cause costly tensions in the economy at the expense of growth and employment. The determined efforts of Greece to achieve such convergence have to be commended. However, it is too early to reach a firm conclusion. Next year, the European Central Bank (ECB) will produce a convergence report to analyse what has been accomplished. Let me repeat and underline that achieving convergence is not a process which ends with adopting the euro. On the contrary, being a member of the euro area and being able to benefit from the potentially great opportunities that offers call for ongoing adaptation to the new environment and the new rules of the game. It is like in sports: reaching the top is difficult, but staying there is even harder. 1  BIS Review 113/1999  Integrating one or more of the EU Member States which have not previously introduced the euro will be a challenge for the euro area. However, an even greater challenge for Europe as a whole lies ahead. I am referring to the enlargement of the European Union. First, I shall deal with that process in general. Then, I should like to say a few words about how the Eurosystem (i.e.
In the seven years that followed, our annual productivity growth averaged just below zero. Or to look at it another way, the level of labour productivity – output per hour worked – in the UK economy is now 15% below where it would have been if pre-crisis trends had continued. Of course, a hit to productivity is what you expect to happen in a financial crisis and deep recession. Firms cut production but try to hold onto workers. But even compared to the experience of others, the UK’s productivity performance has been disturbingly weak. It is true that the average output per hour of the rest of the G7 advanced economies is only around 5% above its pre-crisis level. But as I have noted, in the UK it has not even recovered to that level. And in 2013 output per hour in the UK was 17 percentage points below the average for the rest of the G7 – the widest gap since 1992. I am very conscious that in talking about the importance of productivity growth before this audience tonight I am taking coals to Newcastle – or should I say cylinder heads to Dagenham. But, against this background of the UK’s productivity performance since the crisis, I want to review the prospects for the UK economy, the uncertainties that we on the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) now face and the importance of productivity growth going forward.

We are now getting close to the end of that reservoir of spare labour supply. It is very difficult to say how close; measuring spare capacity in the economy with great precision – to single decimal points – is not really possible. But for the economy to grow robustly and sustainably over the next few years’ productivity growth will need to begin to pick up. This does not need to happen overnight. But it does need to happen. The MPC’s economic forecast I am pleased to be able to say that this is the central scenario in the MPC’s latest forecast. Our forecast is for the economy to grow robustly at around 2.5% a year over the next three years. That is a bit slower than the average annual growth rate of nearly 3% in the seven years before the crisis. But it’s a great deal better than the roughly 0.5% annual average over the seven years that followed. In our forecast, growth continues to be driven by private domestic demand – essentially, household consumption and business investment, both of these have been growing strongly since the middle of 2013. Of course, given our history any forecast of sustained robust consumption growth in the UK automatically raises eyebrows; the suspicion of a debt fuelled spending boom is never far away. But our forecast of strong consumption growth over the next three years does not depend on an increase in household debt.