samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
The yields of government securities and interest rates on lek deposits have also fallen, whereas the interest rate on lek loans continues to move in line with a medium-term downward trend. Overall, while downward, the credit cost takes into account high risk levels arising from loan default. Monetary indicators have reflected developments in the real economy and exercised low inflationary pressures. Broad money expanded 2.8% in January, from 2.3% a month earlier, in annual terms, driven mainly by the expansion of the forex component. Credit to the private sector maintained the annual contraction rates in January, standing at – 1.4%. The banking system continues to be well capitalised, with sound financial parameters. But, the banking system’s lending continues to reflect the private sector’s weak demand for funds, resulting from the downward credit demand and added prudence by banks when lending. *  *  *  New available data support our assessment for gradual growth of the economy in the quarters ahead. The transmission of the monetary stimulus, payment of arrears by the Government to businesses, and improvement of confidence are expected to boost consumption and investments in Albania. Also, the steady recovery of the global economy is expected to boost foreign demand and its contribution to aggregate demand. The Albanian economy, however, is expected to operate below its potential in the period ahead. Below-potential economic growth and low inflationary pressures from the foreign sector are expected to be reflected in low inflation rates, in the short-term period.

Recent Developments: Status of Consultations and the October Press Release In that vein, I’d like to discuss the status of our discussions and especially the proposals for managing credit risk. By now you’ve no doubt read that the Basel Committee agreed two weeks ago on a breakthrough plan to address the final issues raised in public consultations and to complete the new rules. This was a difficult task, as the Committee received over 200 comment letters from the industry and the broader public on the Third Consultative Paper, or “CP3”. While we might have been somewhat surprised by the number of responses that we received, we were not surprised by the hard work that was evident in the letters. In addition, we will have further valuable information from national consultative processes such as that under way in the United States. The comment letters were positive and offered constructive suggestions on a wide range of issues. Indeed, even among the most critical of respondents, one finds support for the introduction of the “three pillars” of the New Accord and its aim to align capital more closely to risk; for the development of greater consistency in the supervisory review of capital adequacy; and for strengthening the effectiveness of market discipline through enhanced transparency. It was, moreover, satisfying for us that most commentators acknowledged substantial improvements in the proposals since the release of the second consultative paper in early 2001.
And debt levels in emerging market economies are much higher than they were before the crisis. This is a source of potential vulnerability as interest rates rise. Downside risks around baseline growth forecasts have declined – there is more consensus now about growth outcomes. But tail risks arising from economic policy and geopolitical uncertainties persist. One, trade protectionism. An escalation of trade tensions could disrupt global supply chains and curtail international trade, with an outsized impact on many small open economies in Asia, including Singapore. Two, disorderly Brexit negotiations could weigh on consumption and investment in the UK, with spillover effects on the Eurozone’s exports and growth. Trade and banking channels could transmit these shocks to Asia. Three, rising populist and nationalist sentiments could compel politicians to take measures that unnerve investors and depress economic growth. SINGAPORE ECONOMY Against this backdrop, the Singapore economy is forecast to grow by 1-3% this year, with a strong likelihood that it would be higher than the 2% registered last year. Growth has been somewhat uneven across sectors but this is to be expected in the initial stages of an external-led pickup. Growth is expected to gradually broaden to the rest of the economy over the course of the year. It is useful to look at the sectoral distribution of growth from the perspective of the three broad clusters in the economy. The trade-related cluster has been a major driver behind the rebound in the economy since Q4 last year.

Working closely with the Commercial Affairs Department and the Attorney-General’s Chambers, MAS undertook a rigorous probe of these transactions which were part of a large, complex, cross-border money laundering scheme. Last year, I said that the findings on the 1MDB-related transactions that flowed through here had made a dent in our reputation as a clean and trusted financial centre. I believe we have begun the process of restoring that reputation. We have taken tough and unprecedented enforcement actions and sent an unequivocal message that MAS will not tolerate the criminal abuse of Singapore’s financial system. Just last month, we announced the completion of an intensive two-year long review of banks connected to 1MDB-related transactions known to-date. All in, we have closed 2 merchant banks and fined 8 banks nearly $ million – the heaviest aggregate financial penalties to-date. We have also issued prohibition orders (POs) against 4 individuals and served notices of intention to issue POs against 3 others for various regulatory breaches. MAS also issued lifetime bans, for the first time, against 2 of these individuals. MAS’ regulatory actions so far are based on what we know to-date. Thanks to excellent co-operation we have had with overseas jurisdictions, Singapore authorities were able to obtain good intelligence and piece together most of the significant flows from end to end. We have found nothing new in the latest filing by the US Department of Justice that warrants further action by us.
This analysis contains an important misperception. Stability is not an end to itself. It is a necessary condition for growth and social justice. An environment of stable prices establishes a necessary condition for output growth by reducing uncertainties and distortions, lengthening decision-making horizons and allowing for an increase in investments and productivity gains. There is no dichotomy between price stability and economic growth, as stability paves the road for growth. Price stability allows the country to plan government actions. Moreover, it should be made clear that there is no such thing as a choice of higher sustainable growth with higher inflation. No country in the world has experienced prolonged periods of economic growth with high rates of inflation. Nonetheless, examples abound of short periods of growth driven by mistaken policies, usually inflationary, which were followed by recession and stagnation that lasted for much longer periods. The Central Bank's goal is, therefore, to contribute to economic growth by maintaining price stability. In the long run, higher productivity is the element that underpins economic growth. To achieve higher productivity growth, it is essential to increase the public sector's savings rate, thereby allowing society to invest in production as opposed to primarily financing the public sector. Aside from its effect on output growth, a permanent reduction in inflation inherently and unmistakably brings about a reduction in poverty, with the consequent social inclusion, in addition to sowing the seeds for reducing inequality.

Access to credit  Mar-17  Oct-16  May-16  Dec-15  Jul-15  Feb-15  Sep-14  Apr-14  Nov-13  Jun-13  Jan-13  Aug-12  Mar-12  Oct-11  May-11  Dec-10  Jul-10  Feb-10  Sep-09  Apr-09  Nov-08  Jun-08  Jan-08  Aug-07  Mar-07  percent 24 22 20 18 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 2 0  Interest rate of mortgage loans, RON (%)  Interest rate for new mortgage loans, RON (%)  ROBOR 3 M  price to income  Source: Eurostat, NBR, Credit Bureau  10  Figure 14. Mortgage credit and the gross savings rate percent 30  percent 16 14  Figure 15. Share of local currency mortgages percent 100  25 75  12 20  10 8  15  6  50  10  4  25  5  "First house" (%GDP) Mortgage credit other than "First House" (%GDP) Gross saving (%GDP) (rhs)  Source: NBR, FNGCIMM, World Bank  dec.-16  mar.-16  iun.-15  sep.-14  mar.-13 dec.-13  iun.-12  sep.-11  dec.-10  mar.-10  Mortgage credit (%GDP)  0 iun.-09  2016  2015  2014  2013  2012  2011  2010  2009  2008  0 2007  0  sep.-08  2  Share of outstanding RON mortgage-backed credit (%) Share of new RON mortgage-backed credit (%)  Source: NBR, Credit Bureau  11  Figure 16.
The Banco de España projections include a third scenario, in which the materialisation of some of these risks might give rise to a decline in GDP for this year of 15%. 3. Economic policy in the second phase of the crisis The key magnitudes of these forecasts illustrate the challenges we face and the need to formulate a forceful economic policy response. I shall now turn to detailing the main elements which, in my view, this response should include. As earlier stated, in this second phase of the crisis economic policy should combine two objectives: to support the recovery and provide for the structural adjustment of the economy. First, I shall broach the policies relating to the monetary and financial areas. As part of the European Central Bank (ECB), the Banco de España contributes to such policy decisions at the European level. Here the priority should continue to be to support the recovery and maintain financial stability. As mentioned in my previous testimony to the Economic Committee, I believe we should all share the goal of preventing the current crisis from being  3  accompanied by a generalised tightening of financing conditions or from seriously harming our financial system. In this connection, and in relation to monetary policy, we have on the ECB Governing Council reiterated our commitment to doing everything needed to support euro area citizens in these extremely difficult times.

The initiative is calling for three things: first, the SNB should hold at least 20% of its assets in gold; second, it should no longer be allowed to sell any gold at any time; and third, all of its gold reserves should be stored in Switzerland. Let me address the last point first. Today, 70% of our gold reserves are stored in Switzerland, 20% are held at the Bank of England and 10% at the Bank of Canada. As you know, a country’s gold reserves usually have the function of an asset to be used only in emergencies. For that reason, it makes sense to diversify the storage locations. In addition, it makes sense to choose locations where gold is traded, so that it can be sold faster and at lower transaction costs. The UK and Canada both meet that criterion. In addition, they both have a strong and reliable legal system and we have every assurance that our gold is safe there. 6  Christensen and Krogstrup (2014), Filardo and Hofmann (2014), Stein (2012), Williams (2013) and references therein. 7  Chodorow-Reich (2014), IMF (2013). 8  Rajan (2013). BIS central bankers’ speeches  3  The initiative’s demand to hold at least 20% of our assets in gold would severely restrict the conduct of monetary policy. Monetary policy transactions directly change our balance sheet. Restrictions on the composition of the balance sheet therefore restrict our monetary policy options.
Lars Nyberg: Will cash replace cards? Speech by Mr Lars Nyberg, Deputy Governor of the Sveriges Riksbank, at the Cards and Cash Payments Forum, Stockholm, 3 May 2011. *  *  *  I would like to thank Björn Segendorff for his contributions to this speech. Since the latter half of the 19th century, the theory of evolution has gained general acceptance. It is considered to be self-evident that better-adapted species will outcompete those that are less-well adapted. Environmental changes may even lead to some species becoming extinct. There are no longer any sabre-toothed tigers or mammoths because the Ice Age is over. A new species may also be superior to another species in a crucial way. This is why we no longer see Neanderthals walking the streets. Nevertheless, some other amazingly old species are still with us. Crocodiles have been around for 85 million years and the coelacanth, if I am correctly informed, can be traced back 400 million years! An evolutionary process, although of a slightly different kind, is now also taking place on the payment market. Rapid technological development is changing the world around us. New payment methods are arising. Bank cards and credit cards have become a natural part of our everyday lives, as has Internet banking. In Sweden, cheques have been outcompeted and are hardly used at all. The number of paper-based giro payments is falling rapidly and it also appears that the use of cash is declining.

The value of the banknotes and coins in circulation has fallen from 9.6% of GDP in 1950 to 2.9% in 2010. So, the question is: Should cash be compared with the extinct Neanderthals or the surviving Crocodiles? But why is this of interest to the Riksbank? Well, a first obvious answer is because it is the Riksbank that issues banknotes and coins. Another, and more complicated, answer is because one of the tasks of the Riksbank is to promote a safe and efficient payment system. This may sound a little high-flown, but it means, among other things, that we should promote the development of safe and efficient payments. This is why we have a natural interest in cards and cash. Hence, we are interested in the evolution of the market for payments, and that is why I am standing before you today. What I intend to talk about today is why I believe that cash will continue to play an important role in our payment system for the foreseeable future (even though not 85 million years) and why cards and other technological developments will not be able to fully take the place of cash. Ironically, part of the explanation for this lies in the strong position that debit and credit cards hold on the Swedish market. As usual I would like to make clear that my speech is an expression of my own views and that it may not necessarily be shared by my colleagues in the Board of the Riksbank.
These three arenas of uncertainty – macroeconomic, financial asset pricing, and the financial system – are of course intertwined, but I shall initially find it convenient to unbundle them. Macroeconomic and monetary policy uncertainties The characteristics of the Great Stability, as some economists call it1, are by now familiar. Essentially, low inflation on average; much less persistence in deviations of inflation from central banks’ explicit or implicit targets; and much lower volatility in both output growth and inflation2. Some of the credit is typically given to better monetary regimes, and I believe it should be. Yet policy makers also stress a wide range of uncertainties, threatening at least interruptions to the benign conditions of the past decade or so. This is not just an occupational disposition of central bankers. To varying degrees, these uncertainties do feature in real-world policy debates. I have argued previously3 that some risks – such as those posed by global current account imbalances – could not sensibly be factored in to policy settings ahead of their crystallising. But uncertainties about the structure of the economy and how monetary policy works do somehow have to feature in our policy judgments, as I can illustrate with the thinking behind my vote at the MPC’s November meeting4. Essentially, I balanced two quite different, but quite likely, views of the outlook, which I shall label Orthodox and Alternative.

However, the treatment of OFCs varies a lot across the G718, and so their data are not strictly comparable with the UK M4 numbers. More important, so far as I can tell, most current calculations of world money growth19 simply add up domestic money supplies, and so leave out cross-border money holdings. That might be a material omission. For example, external holdings of sterling deposits with the UK banking system have increased by more than domestic money since the late 1990s; and by around 15% over the past year. How much of this growth is attributable to non-bank financial groups, whether based in the UK or overseas, is not known. Like much of the monetary analysis of the early 1980s, I fear that this is rather inconclusive, other than underlining that one has to get one’s hands dirty in analysing the money numbers. It is plausible that a decent chunk of recent UK M4 growth should be seen in the light of structural change in the financial system. Essentially, some types of non-bank financial intermediation have become more significant, and seem to have entailed higher money holdings on the definitions currently employed. If so, recent OFC money growth does not of itself obviously have malign implications for money spending and inflation. Originate and distribute: what’s going on on bank balance sheets? Much of the debate about this renewed process of disintermediation has revolved around whether the burgeoning growth of, for example, structured credit vehicles and hedge funds increases or impairs the resilience of the system.
Monetary policy decisions usually include a statement of bias, ie the probability that the next change in interest rates will be an increase or a reduction. At the same time as the press release, a press conference is held at which a more detailed account of the background for the decision is given. BIS Review 105/2000  14  15  BIS Review 105/2000  On 20 September this year, Norges Bank decided to increase its key interest rate, the deposit rate, by 0.25 percentage point to 7%. This has brought the overall increase in interest rates this year to 1.5 percentage points. This has happened in a climate of interest rate rises in other countries and a relatively weak effective krone exchange rate. Moreover, the past year has seen increased risk that price and cost inflation may remain considerably higher in Norway than in other European countries. Norges Bank had no choice but to counter this, in order to satisfy the fundamental preconditions for exchange rate stability. This is why the Bank has raised its key rates. I would like to conclude by once again thanking you for inviting me to give this account of the basis for Norwegian monetary policy. References: Akram, Q F (2000): “PPP despite real shocks: An empirical analysis of the Norwegian real exchange rate”. Working paper 2000/7, Norges Bank, Oslo.

In its conduct of monetary policy, Norges Bank places emphasis on satisfying the fundamental preconditions for exchange rate stability against the euro: instruments must be oriented with a view to reducing price and cost inflation to the level aimed at by the European Central Bank (ECB). At the BIS Review 105/2000  8  same time, monetary policy must not in itself contribute to deflationary recessions, as this could undermine confidence in the krone. According to the Maastricht Treaty, the main objective of the ECB is the maintenance of price stability. The ECB has defined price stability as inflation of less than 2%. Inflation in Norway cannot remain higher than inflation in the euro area year after year without this having consequences for the exchange rate of the Norwegian krone against the euro. If price and cost inflation remains higher than the rate of increase aimed at by the ECB over a long period, our experience indicates that the krone will depreciate against the euro sooner or later. Norges Bank must therefore counter such a development. There are institutional differences between the Norwegian monetary policy regime and monetary policy in countries with an inflation target. Norges Bank will inform the government authorities (via the Ministry of Finance) if measures other than those available to the central bank are required in the event that the krone exchange rate cannot be returned to its initial range without creating inflation or a deflationary recession.
BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  •  Doing so, without recourse to public funds. What this implies for the size of MREL and TLAC is the same. Resources should be sufficient to support the continuation of critical economic functions at the point of resolution. Based on an assumption that going concern capital is eroded on the way in to resolution, this implies that there is sufficient loss absorbency to convert to equity capital to stabilise the firm. Stabilisation for this purpose means having resources available to allow the firm to be reauthorised by all relevant home and host supervisors and to maintain market access. All of these factors are set out in the EBA’s technical standard. The same considerations are described in the principles that cover the FSB Term Sheet. It is worth pausing to unpack what this is likely to mean for different sorts of firm and different group structures. Certainly for G-SIBs, the assumption lying behind the calibration of TLAC is that given the size and complexity of their operations and their activities cross-border it is hard to conceive of a significant restructuring at the point of resolution. Rather the accent is on stabilising the firm via bail-in 2 to restore solvency to buy time for an orderly restructuring and/or a solvent wind-down afterwards. This should be good for the system and, by preserving value, for creditors of the firm. By contrast, a very small bank may need no MREL beyond its current capital requirements.

Similarly European resolution authorities setting MREL in the EU will need to consider how to go from MREL in current liability structures to an MREL that ultimately meets the BRRD objectives. The RTS allows transitional MREL to be set until 2020. Work needs to be done to clean up existing liability structures to make them consistent with requirements. This is firm level work which will be addressed as part of the resolution planning process. Let me give you some examples of what I have in mind. •  My first is structured notes. Some respondents to the FSB consultation suggested the blanket exclusion of structured notes from TLAC should be relaxed. We are reflecting on that. But the current situation is that in many cases structured notes have been issued to meet the needs of often quite small pockets of investors. The result is that some firms have many thousands or even tens of thousands of notes outstanding each with different structures and embedded derivatives. Trying to value all these instruments and bail them in would be a barrier to making resolution work. And as such will need to be addressed as part of the resolution planning process for a particular firm. •  My second example is non-equity capital instruments issued out of operating companies. As I described earlier, SPE strategies are built around putting only the top company in a group into resolution and avoiding legal risk and the potential dislocation of systemic functions by keeping operating subsidiaries outside resolution.