samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
The forecast In conclusion I want to make some brief remarks about the future, using our latest Inflation Report as the chief starting point. The main scenario there is based on the prospect of what might be called a normal cyclical development, driven above all by an international recovery, good disposable incomes and a relatively weak exchange rate (Diagram 5). BIS Review 89/2001  5  5. GDP Sweden, percentage annual change before and after bottoming out of economy 1977 Q4 1981 Q1 1993 Q3 1997 Q1 2002 Q2 Forecast  6 5 4 3  6 5 4 3  2  2  1  1  0  0  -1  -1  -2  -2  -3  -3 -4  -4 -6  -5  -4  -3  -2  -1  0  1  2  3  4  5  6  Source: The Riksbank  Unchanged appraisal of the krona’s fundamental value Our assessment of the future exchange rate is somewhat less optimistic than before. This has to do not so much with new information as with the weak tendency in the past year. In the case of a variable that is so notoriously difficult to predict, the assumption about the future is always partly educational. A major aim on this occasion was to avoid an assessment of inflation that could be perceived as unrealistic.

Central bank money has traditionally only been made available to the general public in physical form – in other words, cash. The aim of retail CBDCs is to create a digital form of central bank money that can be used by everyone. In contrast, central bank money already exists in digital form for wholesale purposes. Wholesale CBDC projects are about making digital interbank transactions, such as securities settlement and cross-currency payments, safer and more efficient. This in turn means that different actors are involved in retail and wholesale CBDC projects. Retail CBDC projects involve a wide range of stakeholders: legislators, the retail payments ecosystem and the broader public. This is because retail CBDC is new. How it is designed and distributed needs to be considered very carefully to ensure that it responds to public policy objectives and does not have unintended effects on financial intermediation. Work on wholesale CBDC, meanwhile, involves a narrower set of stakeholders that already use digital central bank settlement infrastructures today, such as banks or central securities depositories. And in the future, new stakeholders could potentially take part in the wholesale settlement chain using new technologies such as DLT. So when central banks talk about wholesale CBDCs, we are not debating whether to introduce them. We are discussing how to improve and modernise services that we already offer today. Modernising wholesale CBDC I would therefore like to focus on our continuous efforts to improve wholesale payment systems.
These restrictions thus operate by strengthening the borrower’s solvency and, thereby, limiting the potential losses that banks would subsequently have to bear. 10  These restrictions are solely applicable to banks’ new lending business; hence, immediately, their introduction causes banks to restrict the supply of credit. And this prompts an immediate effect on households’ and firms’ consumption and investment decisions. These agents will presumably reduce their level of spending and, consequently, their demand for credit. Also, financial and real asset prices will be adversely affected by the lower level of spending and by the expectations channel, reducing the collateral available. These effects feed into each other, further reducing credit supply and demand. Selecting the specific characteristic of loans that will be subject to limits at each point in time will depend on the situation we are in; in particular, on the level of and developments in loans already granted. This is without ruling out the possibility that limits will have to be set on several characteristics simultaneously, since the evidence available shows that, when easy conditions are observed in several of these characteristics, there is usually a more than proportionate increase in the probability of default. Moreover, when only one of the characteristics is limited, it is usual for another characteristic to become looser, lessening the impact of the limit imposed [see, for example, Tzur-Ilan (2017)]. This type of tool is not harmonised at the international level or in the EU, and some countries use them mainly on mortgage loans to households.

A recent Banco de España article8 finds that this measure has, in conjunction with other measures adopted, enabled the provision of bank lending to the productive sectors of the economy to be increased. Also, the ESRB has during the crisis analysed various issues, such as: i) the implications for the financial system of the public guarantee programmes and other fiscal measures to protect the real economy; ii) the lack of market liquidity and its consequences for asset management and insurance companies; iii) the procyclical impact of debt downgrades on markets and financial institutions, and iv) the liquidity risks derived from margin calls. These avenues of research led to a set of recommendations for the EU Member States’ authorities to act in unison on the appropriate monitoring of the risks and vulnerabilities identified and on potential measures to mitigate them during the crisis. The future of macroprudential policy Allow me to conclude with some brief thoughts on the future of macroprudential policy. In my view, there are two aspects on which we should focus in the coming years. First, the current crisis should be used to draw lessons about macroprudential policy; and, among these lessons, one key aspect relates to the use of capital buffers. The empirical evidence shows that it is precisely during crises when the CCyB and, generally, the instruments that increase capital requirements acquire their full potential via the effects of their release [see Broto and Galán (2020)].
The Economic Outlook Understanding the fundamentals driving g-star and r-star provides a helpful backdrop for what’s going on in the economy today, and an indication of what we should expect in the future. What is the current economic outlook? The potential growth rate, or g-star, currently appears to be about 2 percent. That may sound low to many of you, but remember that labor force and productivity trends have slowed considerably relative to the past, and that’s unlikely to change anytime soon. By comparison, actual GDP growth for 2018 came in at just above 3 percent. A number of positive tailwinds gave the economy this extra boost. Strong global growth, fiscal stimulus, and accommodative financial conditions all helped drive strong headline GDP growth and a tight labor market. These tailwinds have calmed, and in fact reversed in some cases, and I expect growth to slow considerably relative to last year, to around 2 percent. Three developments contribute to this view: a downturn in global growth, heightened geopolitical uncertainty, and the effects of tighter financial conditions. Starting with global growth, the outlook in both Europe and China has become less bright, with the downgrade to the outlook in Europe notable. This means less demand for our exports. In addition, there’s geopolitical risk on the horizon that’s creating angst. I know we’re all on tenterhooks waiting to see what will happen at the end of this month to our good friends across the pond. And concerns around trade negotiations continue to loom large.

Given that this research was originally focused on the reasons r-star had risen, it’s ironic that I and others have ultimately dedicated much more of our careers to understanding why it’s dropped. In recent years, r-star has been averaging well below 1 percent. And it’s actually now lower than at any time before the Great Recession. One of the reasons for this dramatic decline in r-star lies in changes to the major factors determining potential growth: labor force growth and productivity growth. Baby boomers are retiring and fertility rates have come down. Both of these demographic shifts have significantly slowed labor force growth relative to past decades. Productivity growth has also fallen considerably from the boom years of the late 1990s and early 2000s. All the rapid changes in technology that we see around us every day may make this seem 1/4  BIS central bankers' speeches  counterintuitive. But for the moment, being able to order a Nintendo Switch and have it arrive the same day is, shockingly, not increasing productivity in a meaningful way. I could go on for quite some time on this topic, but will leave it to another day! I should note that these demographic and productivity trends are not unique to the United States. In fact, we’ve seen similar slowdowns in growth and sharp declines in r-star in other advanced economies.1 So why did I take you back to simple days of the millennium bug, when you were playing Snake on your phone and ordering takeout from a paper menu?
While it is imperative that takaful operators seek to provide as seamless an experience as possible in terms of online content for consumers, this does not have to lead to the substitution of agents. On the contrary. Agents can in fact enrich the process by being trained and equipped with useful tools to guide and advise potential customers. Agents should also work with aggregators as a means to develop an online presence, in the same way real estate agents are featured on property websites. It is important to note, however, that technology is only a platform, a tool. Without strategy or purpose, the adoption of tech alone cannot spur change. What is needed to complement this is a fresh approach to business. This means broadening one’s horizons beyond given market conventions, and being courageous to compete in new, unexplored strategic areas. Compete better – and more broadly To truly capture the market of the future, agents will need to sharpen their competitive edge. There are many ways to go about this, but I’d like to talk about two in particular: Doing what you already do better, and doing it for a much broader market. 2/5  BIS central bankers' speeches  Akio Morita, the co-founder of Sony, once said about his company’s products – “We don’t ask consumers what they want… We focus on what they need, what they will want and make sure we’re there, ready.” I find this relevant to the role of agents today.

Bearing in mind the structure of the European System of Central Banks, the merit of endowing the euro zone monetary policy with a single voice and, more important, a single soul in such a short time has been immense. It is thus a privilege for me today to be accompanied by two very distinguished economists and policymakers, from whose experience and expertise I am sure we will all benefit greatly. Introduction: The concept of efficiency The analysis of efficiency is a matter that has required the attention of a sizable number of papers in the literature. Both the approaches adopted and the results obtained differ. Of what there is no doubt is how important the idea of efficiency has been and continues to be. It is a pleasure for me today to share some thoughts with you on the dimension this concept acquires for the financial system as a whole and for savings banks. I would wish these thoughts to be of a general nature; but they will inevitably be influenced by the Spanish savings-bank experience. Efficiency relates the cost incurred to the product obtained. In general terms, the idea of efficiency broadly refers to the fact of using limited resources in the best possible way. In other words, an economic system is efficient if it does not waste its resources, in such a way that it maximises individuals’ well-being. BIS Review 31/2003  1  I would add two further thoughts on applying the idea of efficiency to credit institutions.
The international integration of finance and production flows made it possible for the sub-prime crisis in the US real estate market to spread so quickly to so many countries. The global extent of the crisis called for rapid and coordinated intervention. And that is exactly what happened – governments and central banks around the world joined together and took decisive action. The extent of this cooperation was unprecedented in both scale and scope. It prevented a worst-case outcome. Nonetheless, the world economy experienced the most severe financial and economic crisis since the 1930s. What was impressive about the crisis was the speed and force with which it spread not only through financial markets, but also impacted world trade. In just three quarters, world trade contracted by 15%. This was by far the most significant decline since World War Two. 1 The slump was particularly pronounced in the goods trade. 2 As a small open economy, Switzerland could not escape this historical collapse in world trade. Exports and, in particular, goods exports were hit hard. However, compared with other industrialised countries – especially Germany – the decline was less pronounced. What’s  1  Cf. WTO (2010): World trade 2009, prospects for 2010. 2  Cf. Richard Baldwin (2010): The great trade collapse: What caused it and what does it mean?

But even for exports of processed metal goods and machinery does Switzerland have higher export unit values than, for instance, the EU. 15  Looking at developments over the last 20 years, it is primarily the prices of watch exports that have risen considerably. 16  Ireland also exports a lot of chemical and pharmaceutical products. Besides, the unit values of its exports of electronic products are also very high. 6  BIS Review 157/2010  Chart 3  Source: Eurostat. Overall, the results from a unit value analysis support the assessment that Switzerland is specialised in the production of high quality products. This is in line with previous studies. These show that Swiss export products largely compete on quality, rather than on price. 17 Given the level of know-how in Switzerland, this ought to be the case in the future as well, assuming that Swiss products can continue to fulfil the ever-growing demands on quality. To what extent could this have had a positive influence on the way in which exports developed in the most recent crisis? For the short term, at least, it can be assumed that higher quality products are more difficult to substitute than relatively homogenous goods. This applies not only to pharmaceuticals, but also to highly specialised products such as precision instruments. And this was indeed the case during the most recent crisis – Swiss exports of precision instruments receded only slightly, and have since risen to such an extent that they now already exceed their pre-crisis level.
Special courts were also set up, with over 570,000 claims received to date, of which more than 250,000 are still pending resolution. You are all no doubt aware that these high litigiousness figures entail a most considerable 2/6  BIS central bankers' speeches  workload for our already overburdened legal system, as well as involving a high economic and reputational cost for financial institutions. But I would further stress that the uncertainty associated with litigiousness may ultimately restrict or raise the cost of access to credit, harming bank customers. The lack of legal certainty prevents anticipation of the costs and risks associated with a transaction, which particularly affects very long-term operations, such as mortgage loans. Unsurprisingly, banks build into prices the costs associated with such uncertainty. I believe we can concur that legal certainty is well worth protecting, given that it is to everybody’s benefit. The regulations must guarantee this certainty, which is perfectly compatible with the proper protection of bank customers. In this respect, I believe the Law on Real Estate Credit is fit for purpose, as it straddles both elements. Law on Real Estate Credit The starting point for the rules in question here is the asymmetrical position of the lender and the borrower in the contractual relationship. In that light, the Law considers that it does not suffice to provide information to and warn the customer; rather, it demands of the professional party, which dominates the relationship, even more accountability in its behaviour towards the borrower.

Lim Hng Kiang: Towards a new era of growing connectivity between Asia and the Middle East Opening address by Mr Lim Hng Kiang, Minister for Trade and Industry and Deputy Chairman of the Monetary Authority of Singapore, at the 2nd World Islamic Banking Conference: Asia Summit 2011, Singapore, 8 June 2011. *  *  *  Your Excellencies, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, Introduction 1. I am honoured to be invited to deliver the opening address at the 2nd World Islamic Banking Conference: Asia Summit (WIBC Asia). I would like to extend a warm welcome to our overseas guests, especially our distinguished speakers who will be sharing their insights during this conference. Growing connectivity between Asia and the Middle East 2. Despite the recent spate of shocks, the world economy has been resilient with growth projected to moderate slightly to 4.5%1, compared to 5.8% last year. Downside risks such as high energy and commodity prices, the European debt crises, geopolitical tensions in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) and the Japan tragedy have not substantially derailed the economic momentum. 3. Asia is expected to remain the main locomotive driving economic growth. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) projects Asia’s growth to reach almost 7% this year, led mainly by China at 9.6% and India at 8.2%. Asia has been, and will still be the key engine for global trade. In 2009, the region accounted for 35% of world exports, up sharply from 25% a decade earlier2.
But its aftermath forces us to confront the need for adjustment with greater urgency, due to the added imposition of extreme cyclical pressures on what were already unsustainable structural relationships. There are now two additional dimensions to the problem: (1) the stress created by exchange rate regimes that link the monetary conditions of economies at very different stages in the business cycle, and (2) the need for far-reaching fiscal adjustment in the crisis-hit economies of the developed world in the coming years. Again, to simplify, take the case of the United States and China. The Chinese economy is experiencing the pressures of rapid economic growth that threaten to lead to overheating. Chinese wages – especially in the coastal regions are rising rapidly and consumer prices, on a year-over-year basis, are rising at about a 5 percent annual rate. In contrast, U.S. inflation is considerably lower, growth is subdued, and the United States is still 7 million jobs short of the peak reached in 2007. An extreme cyclical imbalance exists between the EME world and the United States. The monetary policy appropriate for the United States is increasingly inappropriate for the vast majority of EMEs and vice versa. This creates for EME authorities a dilemma that cannot be resolved entirely via macro-prudential regulatory policies, regardless of their merit. An EME faces the choice: let its currency appreciate more rapidly and risk losing competitiveness in international markets, or restrain the rise in its currency through intervention and risk inflation.

My goal today is not to play the blame game. We all share responsibility for addressing our current set of challenges. Rather, it is to lay out the reasons why it is imperative that the United States and the EMEs collectively move toward arrangements that put us on a mutually sustainable path. I hope I have been convincing. The United States must provide leadership in this global process. This is in our own national interest. The policy response we need combines fiscal and structural adjustments that would enable the United States to prosper in the next phase of global economic transformation. These issues cannot be addressed primarily thorough monetary policy. However, monetary policy has a role to play in supporting the necessary transitions, and it too needs to be conducted mindful of its global context. As we step up to our responsibilities, we should look to the leading nations of the EME world to provide leadership too, commensurate with their growing importance in the global system, in rebalancing demand and increasing currency flexibility. If we lead together, with mutually supportive actions, we can achieve better outcomes than any of us can achieve on our own. Thank you for your kind attention. 8  BIS central bankers’ speeches
This was thought to be possible if the aim was a more permanent reduction in unemployment and there was a willingness to accept higher inflation in return. But about ten years after the launch of the Phillips curve, Milton Friedman and Edmund Phelps, Nobel laureates in economics themselves, each lay the foundations for the so-called “expectations-augmented Phillips curve”. In brief, this implies that there is a short-term negative correlation between inflation and unemployment, but no long-term relationship. In other words, it is not possible to choose a certain combination of inflation and unemployment and then expect it to last. The reasoning behind this can be illustrated using Figure 2. 3 [16]  Inflation  Figure 2. The expectations-augmented Phillips curve Long run Phillips curve  D  B  E  C A  Unemployment  The short-term correlation basically depends on the fact that higher inflation is often unexpected inflation. An expansionary policy can lead to lower unemployment and higher inflation; we move from A to B. But gradually, agents in the economy realise that inflation has risen and demand higher wage increases as compensation. In other words, the higher inflation is incorporated in the expectations and becomes the norm, and the higher wage increases cause unemployment to rise. The short-term correlation shifts upwards and we move from B to C. We are then back to the same unemployment as when we started, but with higher inflation.

Sources: Statistics Sweden and the Riksbank  Of course, the correlation between the exchange rate and inflation is neither clear-cut nor straightforward. It depends, for example, on what has caused the exchange rate to fluctuate and how long it is expected to last. 6 But the fact that there is a correlation, insofar as a weakening of the exchange rate tends to result in rising inflation and vice versa, is obvious. Finally, it should be emphasised that monetary policy has of course been important in this development. From the ongoing debate, the impression can sometimes be that monetary policy does not play such a major role and that economic activity had been just as strong and inflation had been on target regardless of the policy conducted by the Riksbank. This is of course not the case. No causal relationship between wages and prices What then does the fact that inflation has risen but not wages actually signify? To begin with, and for the sake of completeness, we can also plot inflation against wage increases (see Figure 8). As we see, there is a tendency towards a positive correlation, at least periodically. See for instance the articles “The impact of the exchange rate on inflation” in the December 2016 Monetary Policy Report and “The exchange rate and inflation” in the April 2018 Monetary Policy Report. 6  13 [16]  Figure 8.