samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
Another issue is whether a mood of mutual understanding can be created about the reform and construction of labour market rules and other measures that can help to reduce unemployment. My intention this evening has not been to present a deeper analysis of the labour market problems, nor to answer questions about what needs to be done. But perhaps I have contributed by raising some of the questions that need to be answered and by defining the function of monetary policy and what it can do. If we are to achieve a lasting return just to something resembling the unemployment figures we have been accustomed to in Sweden, there will have to be a proper discussion of which measures are needed to bring unemployment down. 10  See note 7. BIS Review 38/1997

There are two cyber threats which the financial sector needs to pay keen attention to. The first is ransomware attacks where the modus operandi has become more threatening. In addition to corrupting a victim’s data using crypto-ransomware, attackers are now exfiltrating information from their victims. 6/9  BIS central bankers' speeches  MAS has asked financial institutions to review the adequacy of their internal IT controls, as well as incident response and business continuity plans to fend against the latest ransomware threats. Second, cyber criminals are targeting major third-party IT vendors to amplify the coverage of their attacks. The cyber attack on Solarwinds is a powerful illustration of the increased sophistication and persistence of cyber criminals. They are now attacking supply chains to infiltrate the networks and systems of multiple entities. MAS has exhorted financial institutions to exercise strong oversight of arrangements with third party service providers, to ensure system resilience and maintain data confidentiality. FINANCIAL SECTOR PERFORMANCE Let me now provide an update on the financial sector. In 2020, the financial services sector 9 grew by 5.1% even as the overall economy contracted. In the first half of this year, we estimate the sector grew by about 6%. Growth has been broad-based across the financial services sector. The banking industry has been supported by strong fee income growth. The insurance industry expanded strongly on the back of robust demand for single-premium life insurance products. The payments industry grew significantly as adoption of e-payments gained traction with businesses and individuals moving towards online transactions.
Chart 8: Accounting for intangibles reduces the missing-investment puzzle  Note: The orange line shows the investment puzzle using industry-level data, and the shaded area around it is the 95% confidence intervals. The line shows the estimated year fixed effects from an industry-level regression of investment rates on the wedge, including industry fixed effects, and standard errors clustered at the industry level. See Appendix B to Bailey et al. (2022) for full details. The blue line shows the same statistic from the regressions in which both investment rates and the wedge are adjusted to include intangibles. See Appendix A.2 to Bailey et al. (2022) for a discussion of the adjustment. Source: ONS, KLEMS, Jordà et al. (2017) Macrohistory Database and authors' calculations. The remaining puzzle is mostly concentrated immediately after the global financial crisis, and so it is possible this is not driven by structural factors, but rather the lingering impact of the global financial crisis, for example related to the sluggish demand recovery or financial frictions. [22] While the results suggest an important role for intangibles in explaining the missing-investment puzzle, a few notes of caution are in order. It could be that certain drivers of investment, such as financial frictions, are captured more accurately only at more granular level, such as in firm-level data. Moreover, there could be large non-linearities related to the nature of the global financial crisis that cannot be captured by the simple regression framework used above.

As we discussed at our briefing last October, part of reason for the more moderate decline in jobs in New York during the recession was a less pronounced boom-bust housing cycle. Indeed, as a percentage, the city and state lost fewer jobs during this recession than they did during either of the last two downturns. By contrast, the downturn in employment in New Jersey in the current cycle was more severe. About 250,000 jobs were lost, or roughly 6.0 percent of total state employment – about the same as in the country as a whole. This decline is comparable to the job losses during the most severe recent recession in the state, that of 1989–1992. Fairfield County in Connecticut, also part of our District, saw declines comparable to the nation, while Puerto Rico experienced much deeper and longer job declines than the nation. In fact, employment in Puerto Rico began declining nearly two years before the onset of the recession on the mainland. Now, as in the nation, a labor market recovery has begun across much of the region. Over the past year, the tri-state region added roughly 100,000 private-sector jobs. Within the region, however, the recovery has been somewhat uneven. New York City, upstate New York and Fairfield County have been gaining jobs for more than a year now – at roughly the same pace as the nation. However, employment in New Jersey has only begun to expand during the past few months. In Puerto Rico, job growth has yet to be firmly established.
In reaction to the taper tantrum, former Governor Jeremy Stein examined the large effects that can be produced if beliefs are dispersed and if ex-ante marginal investors receive information  46  The specific question was: “Please indicate the percent chance you attach to the dollar level of the SOMA portfolio falling within the following ranges at year-end 2014 for each of three hypothetical unemployment rate scenarios.” See the June 2013 SPD survey. 47  “If the outlook for the labor market does not improve substantially, the Committee will continue its purchases of agency mortgage-backed securities, undertake additional asset purchases, and employ its other policy tools as appropriate until such improvement is achieved in a context of price stability.”  48  Bernanke (2015, 549). 49  To quote Bernanke again, “In effect our PhD economists surveyed their PhD economists. It was a little like looking in a mirror. It didn’t tell us what rank-and-file traders were thinking”. BIS central bankers’ speeches  13  that leads them to strongly revise their views about how much risk to take. The outcome could be that the new marginal investor driving market prices has a very different set of beliefs and risk appetite.

10 Some of these questions ask respondents to assign probabilities to various ranges of outcome – so-called density forecasts.11 Generally, people across a wide range of countries and walks of life appear to be able to answer probabilistic questions, and their expectations are found to be useful in forming predictions of future economic outcomes. The survey of consumer expectations Turning now to the development and use of expectations surveys at the New York Fed, let me first discuss our Survey of Consumer Expectations (SCE). Over the last ten years, we extensively tested and eventually implemented a new survey of households, with the goal of collecting timely and accurate information at high frequency on U.S. consumers’ expectations and decisions on a broad variety of topics. The SCE, launched in June 2013, was designed to fill gaps in existing data collections about consumer expectations and outcomes, to provide a more integrated data approach, and to take advantage of state-of-the-art survey techniques. The SCE is implemented as a monthly, nationally representative survey of about 1,300 household heads.12 Recently the Bank of Canada implemented its own version of the SCE, fielded at a quarterly frequency. The SCE has various components, which are outlined on Slide 2. First, respondents are asked a core monthly module of questions concerning their expectations about various macroeconomic and household-level variables. These questions cover inflation expectations and expectations regarding changes in home prices and the prices of various specific goods and services, such as gasoline, food, rent, medical care, and a college education.
Miroslav Singer: The Czech Republic outside EMU – a success story born from painful lessons. A Czech view on resolving the euro crisis Speech by Mr Miroslav Singer, Governor of the Czech National Bank, as part of the OMFIF (Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum) Golden Series on World Money, Reform Club, London, 28 June 2011. *  *  *  A horrible end is better than endless horror. Lieber ein Ende mit Schrecken als ein Schrecken ohne Ende. Ferdinand Von Schill (1776–1808) Ladies and Gentlemen, As we all know, the eurozone is facing serious problems at the present time. It is my opinion that there are important lessons to be learned from the collapse of the Bretton Woods system in the early 1970s. The Czech policy authorities learned these lessons – often the hard way – first of all after the split of Czechoslovakia 1993, and again during the financial and currency crisis that hit the Czech Republic later in the same decade. In my speech today I will recall these lessons and examine how they can be applied in order to minimise the costs of resolving the eurozone debt crisis. Before going any further, however, I’d like to draw your attention to four basic – and surprising, perhaps even shocking – facts about the Czech Republic. First of all, it may come as a shock to some of you to learn that the Czech Republic is not an Eastern European country.

In fact, its capital, Prague, lies more than 90 miles west of Vienna. In the words of a famous Londoner – the actor Michael Caine – “Not a lot of people know that”. What is more, the Czech economy is further west than you might think not just geographically, but also economically. This brings me to shocking fact number two. Despite tepid real growth averaging 3%, the Czech economy has grown by 10% on average in recent years thanks to appreciation of its exchange rate. Therefore, the Czech economy has multiplied in size more than 4.5 times since 1993 in nominal terms in euros. Consequently, it could have bought on average more than 7% p.a. of the core European countries’ real GDP over the last 18 years. And now for shocking fact number three. Despite, or maybe thanks to, our first-hand experience with financial crisis (bad loans exceeded 40% of GDP in the late 1990s), no bailout has been needed and no taxpayers’ money has been used to save any Czech financial firm in the latest turmoil. Finally, and a good deal less shockingly I’m pleased to say, the Czech National Bank has been not only the central bank, but also the integrated supervisor of the Czech financial industry since 2006. This set-up gives us many advantages in terms of dealing with the financial crisis and maintaining financial stability at national level, and it hopefully also enhances our understanding of the current events in the eurozone.
Large-scale support measures deployed by governments and central banks played an essential role in ensuring that the global economy, the financial markets and thus also the banks recovered sooner and more vigorously than had been anticipated a year ago. For the banking sector alone, the major industrial nations committed funds amounting to almost 20% of gross domestic product. As a result of the different measures to support the economy and the banking sector, there has been a considerable rise in the indebtedness of many countries, and also, in some countries, in sovereign credit risk. The international big banks – including the Swiss big banks – benefited substantially from these support measures, and were able to increase their profitability in 2009. At the same time, the Swiss big banks reduced their balance sheets by approximately a quarter. Compared to the previous year, their capital situation improved substantially. Their riskweighted capital ratios, in particular, have increased markedly, and are high also by international standards. This is a very positive development. However, it should not be allowed to conceal the fact that the leverage of both big banks is still high – both per se and when compared with banks in other countries. The big banks are still a long way from meeting the leverage target that will apply in Switzerland from 2013.

4  BIS Review 113/2009  To begin this discussion, I should emphasize that capital inflows to capital-scarce economies are a good thing. We know that capital flows to institutionally strong economies are beneficial (Prasad et al., 2002). Therefore, the role of policy is not to impede capital flows, but to avoid the creation of a bubble in domestic assets with consequences on resource allocation. 5 In this regard, to have in place sound prudential regulation during periods of abundance of capital is essential for financial stability, as we are reminded by the crisis in Chile in the early 1980s, the Mexican crisis of the mid-1990s, the Asian crisis, and more recently, the crisis in Eastern Europe. Even if one could accept that monetary tightening could be an appropriate response to combat an asset price bubble such as the recent housing price bubble, with all the caveats I discussed before, the problem is more acute in small open economies. Tightening monetary policy may have perverse effects, since it induces further capital inflows and strengthens the currency. In this case, the interest rate is not the most adequate instrument with which to burst the bubble.
It is difficult to completely capture a sequence of events where changes in different variables tend to reinforce one another in economic calculations. If the households have also been overly optimistic - irrational - in their expectations, it becomes particularly difficult to capture these effects. It is therefore important for forecasters to make more “qualitative” assessments in addition. Another reason for not trusting solely to formal models based on historical data is that the effects of structural changes that have taken place fairly recently can easily be underestimated. Let me give an example that to some extent captures these problems. During the years from the mid-1980s to the beginning of the 1990s, substantial changes were made in the economic structure and there was a clear correlation between the change in house prices and the change in household borrowing. The decline in house prices during the financial crisis at the beginning of the 1990s was largely due to an unfavourable combination of changes of both a structural and a cyclical nature. In connection with the deregulation of the credit markets during the second half of the 1980s, household borrowing increased substantially and the loans were largely used to buy houses. The fairly high and fluctuating inflation rate contributed to real interest costs after tax often being low, sometimes even negative, which in practice meant that one could at times make a profit from borrowing.

The object of this forum is to discuss the prime pre-conditions to be met by the Bank of Albania before launching the implementation of a new monetary policy strategy, with a particular emphasis on Albania’s membership to the European Union in the long-term run. The fact that we have been successful in controlling inflation during the last years holds true. We have managed to attain a general stability and I believe the policy adopted by us has been one of the key factors. Another fact which holds true is that, for some time, we have been considering to take another step, attempting a more sophisticated, effective and certainly a more responsible and transparent monetary policy approach. To this aim, we have come to the conclusion that the actual framework of the monetary policy requires the necessity of being further completed and perfected with standard elements, adopted by other countries in the world and where the targeting inflation regime has proven to be successful. We are aware that this is not an effortless initiative to be seized. Therefore, I consider that this is a great fortune for the Bank of Albania to have the possibility, on the verge of discussing the preconditions of adopting this regime, to closely discuss and consult the distinguished guests present in this seminar. I trust straight opinions and recommendations shall be brought forth, be they challenging to be accomplished. According to theory, inflation targeting is a direct regime.
What I intend to do this afternoon is first to define what international monetary co-operation is about, and in this connection, survey the attitudes of the parties that should have an interest in such co-operation and discuss the form of this co-operation. I wish to point out that these attitudes have, perhaps unintentionally, led to international monetary co-operation being regionalized. I shall then focus specifically on Asian monetary co-operation, covering the history, or the lack of it, and the monetary problems, current and potential ones, that Asian economies face. I shall then make a case for much greater monetary co-operation in Asia. I shall also suggest a way forward for Asian monetary co-operation, with a strategy and a list of issues to be addressed in such co-operation. Monetary Co-operation 4. Let me start now by attempting a definition on what monetary co-operation is about. The Oxford Dictionary defines “co-operation” as “working together to the same end”. So I suppose monetary co-operation can simply be defined as working together to the same monetary end. This then leads to the questions as to what that same monetary end should be, who should be working together and the form in which they should best work together, particularly when one is talking about monetary co-operation across monetary systems on a global or regional dimension. 5. The Articles of Agreement of the IMF provide some guidance on what that same monetary end should be.

It is my firm belief that fulfilling its primary objective to maintain price stability is not only the best service which the ECB can deliver to the citizens of Europe, but also the most appropriate way of fostering the legitimacy of our new institution. In the first few months of the euro’s existence we have indeed provided an internally stable currency, although the public perception of this accomplishment has often been confused by too much attention on developments relating to the euro’s external value. In this context, allow me to reiterate that the ECB’s monetary policy objective is the internal value of the euro and that in the longer term the euro’s internal strength will also be reflected in its external value. Our task of maintaining price stability will certainly be made easier as the ECB acquires a track record and further builds up its credibility with the markets inside and outside the euro area. In my view, this process will be greatly facilitated by a monetary policy strategy oriented towards guaranteeing price stability in the medium term, rather than responding to short-term considerations. I should emphasise that it is the ECB’s independent status which will continue to allow it to stand above day-to-day pressures, to pursue a stability-oriented policy to the benefit of all citizens without the interference of short-term political objectives and to ignore short-term market developments if they are deemed to be excessive.
We may not see the effects of these reforms right away but we must continue pressing on with the reform effort and not let reform fatigue get in our way. Productivity also depends on the availability and quality of public goods. With a strong fiscal position, the Thai government this fiscal year has opted to pursue much needed infrastructure projects. Key infrastructure investment projects include the expansion of the mass transit network in Bangkok, water resource management, and an integrated logistics system. These public investments will ease bottlenecks and allow firms to focus on improving their efficiency and productivity. The importance of productivity cannot be overstated. But with integrated world financial markets, exporting firms must also learn to cope with exchange rate risk. We encourage exporters to hedge against foreign exchange rate risk, to bill their exports in foreign currencies other than the US dollar, and to use imports as a natural hedge. Your Excellencies, Ladies and gentlemen,  2  BIS Review 20/2007  The risk of global imbalances has been with us and will remain with us for some time to come. Each country has to do its own part in managing the risk. For us, we will forge ahead with our economic and political reforms. But major economies must also do their best to mitigate global imbalances since this is a global problem. We must solve it together. International policy dialogues such as the Fundinitiated Multilateral Consultation would need to be strengthened.

I believe that these fears and concerns are unfounded and that Thailand will persevere. Our outlook for the Thai economy in the medium term is positive. Our forecasts show the Thai economy growing by 4-5 percent in 2007 and by 4-5.5 percent in 2008. These are respectable growth estimates for Thailand in light of the challenges and our focus on growth with stability. In the rest of my talk, I will address in detail the challenges and prospects for the Thai economy going forward. This brings me to the first of my three key points. The first key point is that the Thai economy is no stranger to difficult challenges. And we have always persevered in each instance. In 1997, we had the Asian crisis and undertook painful reforms; in 2001, the global economic downturn adversely impacted the Thai economy; and in the past two years, we had the Tsunami, SARS, the avian flu, southern unrest, political uncertainty, and the recent oil shock. The recent oil shock in particular proved to be a difficult test for the Bank of Thailand. High oil prices have two adverse effects: pressure on prices and a drag on economic growth. Tightening interest rates is the Bank of Thailand's primary defense against inflation. However, high interest rates would burden firms and households already trying to cope with high oil prices. Domestic demand would be adversely affected. There was no clear or easy choice to make.