samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
William C Dudley: The national and regional economic outlook Remarks by Mr William C Dudley, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, at the Center for Economic Development, Syracuse, New York, 12 April 2012. *  *  *  Good morning, I am pleased to be here in Syracuse at the Center for Economic Development. It is always a pleasure to speak with business and community leaders because of the important role you play in helping to shape the economy of the region. I thank you all for inviting me here today. I try to get out of my office in New York City as much as I can to get a sense of regional economic conditions across the second Federal Reserve District. I was last here in Syracuse in 2010 and, more recently, I traveled to West Point and the Capital region and Long Island. These visits are just as important as any trip I might take to Washington, D.C., to help formulate monetary policy, or to Switzerland, to help shape international bank regulation. Each visit within the region helps me to deepen the relationships with the people I represent. I believe that the understanding of issues and concerns that I gain today will help ensure that the Fed’s policy decisions reflect the public interest. Today, I want to talk a bit about the Fed – what we do and why we do it. Then I’ll provide some thoughts about the economic outlook nationally and locally.

Almost 900 businesses responded to our last poll, some of which were from this area. If you, as a representative of a small business, would like to participate in our current poll, please pass your card to my colleagues, who are in the audience, or see me after the speech and we will be glad to add you as a respondent. Results from our prior polls stressed the problem of access to capital. In response we held two workshops at the Bank in December. In the first workshop, senior officers from the Export-Import Bank, the Small Business Administration and the Department of Commerce described the various loan programs available to small businesses from their agencies, as well as programs to help identify markets. The second workshop reviewed the business plans of 40 small businesses and matched them with potential lenders. We plan to hold a similar workshop in Upstate New York this year. As you know, even states that are wealthier, such as New York, have large pockets of poverty. So, we target some of our work specifically to low- and moderate-income groups. We have worked hard to help neighborhoods that face high foreclosure rates, although much remains to be done. We have provided housing advocates with the latest information on mortgage conditions, via mortgage briefs, roundtables, presentations and newsletters. We have developed an interactive online tool that shows monthly delinquency and foreclosure conditions, which we believe will aid the work of housing counselors and other parties seeking to help these communities.
We are an integral part of the global economy. And we had particular problems of our own. In our case, in marked contrast to the Eurozone, and despite the dampening effect of an already exaggeratedly strong exchange rate, we were confronted, in the early part of last year, with the prospect of excess demand and accelerating inflation, and policy had been tightened to head that off. But we, like others, were then hit in the autumn by the renewed turmoil in the global economy. That caused a sharper fall in external demand, but it also caused both business and consumer confidence to plummet – so that prospect of moderate overall slowdown we’d been deliberately trying to engineer quite suddenly threatened to turn into an unnecessarily sharp downturn, with the risk that the rate of inflation would fall significantly below the Government’s 2½% inflation target. So we promptly reversed gear – cutting interest rates very sharply – by 2½% to as low as they have been since the mid-1960s. That has helped both business and consumer confidence to recover – from very low levels – and the prospect now is that, after a pretty flat economic performance either side of the year-end, overall demand and output growth will pick up steadily to around trend by the middle of next year. But, despite these interest rate cuts, the pound has actually strengthened – notably against the euro – in part, as I suggested earlier, because of weaker overall demand pressure on the Continent.

The reason that our interest rates remain higher than those in the Eurozone is that, despite the recent slowdown, our economy is operating closer to capacity than theirs. That’s partly why our rate of unemployment is almost half theirs – though the greater structural flexibility of the British economy is even more important in this context. The MPC sets interest rates to achieve the inflation target. We have made it clear by our actions that we are just as vigorous in relaxing policy when the risks to inflation are on the downside as we are in tightening policy when the risks to inflation are on the upside. That’s the best help that we can give through monetary policy. It does not mean that we ignore the external pressures. In assessing the prospects for the overall economy, and for inflation, we take full account of the impact of world demand and of the exchange rate, just as we take full account of all the domestic factors bearing on inflation prospects. When, as now, the external influences are having a powerful disinflationary effect, monetary policy is of course easier, and interest rates lower, than they would otherwise be. That does not – and cannot – mean that we are able to pursue any particular objective with regard to the exchange rate – or that we respond, Pavlov-like, to exchange rate fluctuations.
Paris FinTech Forum – 25 January 2017 Speech by François Villeroy de Galhau, Governor of the Banque de France and Chairman of the Autorité de contrôle prudentiel et de résolution  France: a European powerhouse for financial service innovation  Good morning to all of you. I am delighted to be here today. Who could have imagined just a few years ago that a central banker would be making an appearance at a forum on innovation? I remember when we first met up, about a year ago, with the developers from the start-up Labo Blockchain to work on a Proof of Concept, everyone from the Banque de France had made an effort: they’d dressed casually for the occasion… except that all the developers had decided to turn up in a suit and tie. It was a complete role reversal! But things change very rapidly. Today, our dealings with innovators go far beyond any of the assumptions we might have had about each other: the Banque de France is testing blockchain technology and is opening a LAB to work with start-ups; the ACPR (the supervisory body which I chair) has welcomed more than 100 key innovators since the creation of its FinTech Innovation Unit, and has set up a FinTech Forum with the AMF to increase our interaction with innovators.

François Villeroy de Galhau: Productivity - a collective enigma? Speech by Mr François Villeroy de Galhau, Governor of the Bank of France, at the Bank of France - France Stratégie Conference, Paris, 1 February 2017. * * * Welcome to all of you. It gives me great pleasure to be able to open this conference on French productivity, organised in conjunction with France Stratégie. The subject is one that is both topical and of great importance to central banks: productivity is one of the principal drivers of growth, and its dynamics are a strong determinant of potential growth, that which is compatible with price stability. As you can see [ slide], after the major wave of expansion witnessed during Les Trente Glorieuses, which was particularly marked in the case of France, productivity growth in advanced countries has slowed in successive stages since the 1970s. Today, it has fallen back to a pace that is historically weak. What are the common factors behind this slowdown in productivity? And is there anything specific to France? I don’t believe so: if there is one thing that is specific to France, it is the high level of hourly productivity – one of the highest in the world, alongside that of the United States and Germany. So, rather than being a French enigma, the enigma we are looking at this morning seems to me to be more of a collective phenomenon.
Still, while by some measures the U.S. Virgin Islands are not as fiscally stressed as Puerto Rico, they, too, do not have access to the debt markets. Recovery and rebuilding The combined impact of complex preexisting economic problems and the hurricanes has made recovery much more challenging. The loss of market access has severely hampered the ability of the governments to mobilize resources to respond to the damage and rebuild and upgrade infrastructures. One example is Puerto Rico’s electrical grid, which is a major obstacle to recovery. Even before Maria, Puerto Rico suffered frequent blackouts, and the high cost and unreliability of electricity 1/3  BIS central bankers' speeches  had reduced business competitiveness. Puerto Rico’s power plants are largely outdated and inefficient, and the electrical distribution system is poorly maintained and extremely fragile. In my mind, given this poor starting point, now is a perfect opportunity for Puerto Rico to essentially start from scratch and build a resilient power generation and distribution network. I would assume that an emphasis on renewable energy would be part of this effort, especially given the dramatic fall in costs for this form of electricity generation. The challenge, of course, will be how to finance this investment, when the Commonwealth is already mired in debt. Despite these woes, there are signs of resilience in Puerto Rico. As we will show, job losses following the storm were very substantial, totaling around 4 percent in Puerto Rico and 8 percent in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

It will be critically important that these decisions put the Commonwealth on a sustainable fiscal path going forward. As in other examples, such as New York City in the 1970s, the fiscal adjustment will be 2/3  BIS central bankers' speeches  painful, and many important decisions will undoubtedly be unpopular. While the pain has been— and will continue to be—widely shared, it is also critical to seek ways to ensure that the benefits from the restoration of growth are shared broadly. How exactly to make this work is an open question that I am certain the oversight board and its stakeholders will consider carefully over the coming months. The New York Fed will continue to help in the best ways we can—by providing independent research and analysis, and by leveraging our convening authority to bring together stakeholders to share expertise, explore opportunities, and provide information to those who need it most. We recently held two events on the Island—one for small business owners impacted by the storm and another for credit unions. We plan to do more in the months and years ahead, and I look forward to gaining a better understanding of conditions on the ground and how we can help when I travel to Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands next month. Now, I’d like to turn it over to Jason Bram, who will talk more about what we are starting to see in terms of the economic impact of the storms.
I had the privilege of hearing General Michael Hayden, former head of the NSA and CIA, address a payments symposium hosted by the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago a few years ago. In that venue, General Hayden spoke of the tectonic shifts affecting the global landscape, and their prospective impact on cyber, terror, and geopolitical threats. His basic message, in two parts: keep your seat belts on, it promises to be a volatile century (yes, century); and when it comes to our critical financial market infrastructure being subject to attack, it is not a matter of “if” but “when". Responding to the current threat environment represents the challenge of our generation; these are days of preparation. I will posit that a fundamental distinction exists between cyber resiliency and traditional resiliency: what works for us in conventional resiliency scenarios, namely the automatic and instantaneous replication of data, works against us in cyber scenarios, reflecting risks that a pernicious malware, or a severe data corruption, or even an application failure propagates itself across primary, secondary, and tertiary operating sites, rendering a systemic infrastructure functionally inoperable. In other venues we have therefore elaborated upon the need for a new paradigm for resiliency, one that endeavors to mate traditional precepts of geographic dispersion of infrastructure and human capital with new realities compelling technological diversity, and a platform for recovery, should the core of a financial market infrastructure become corrupted.

Today, more than 250 Swiss corporations are active in Brazil, which has become the top recipient of Swiss direct investment in Latin America and the fifth-largest worldwide. Despite differences in the structure of our economies - or maybe precisely because of them corporate Switzerland is very engaged in Brazil and has shared, for almost a century now, some of the fortunes and misfortunes affecting the Brazilian economy. After a long period of pegged exchange rates, Brazil recently decided to float its currency, to follow a monetary policy primarily focused on price stability and to reform its public finances. This new economic program seems to bear fruit, as growth has clearly resumed. However, the road to price stability is not an easy one. Inflation, although extremely low in comparison to the four-digit period of the late 80s, is not yet subdued, and the state of government finances is still subject to legitimate worries. The title of my speech is “Monetary independence and monetary stability: two sides of the same coin”. I will start by looking at some of the features which have given Switzerland the reputation of a financially strong country. Among other elements, I will show that price stability has played a central role in this respect. But there can be no monetary stability without an independent central bank and an independent monetary policy course. Drawing on my experience at the Swiss National Bank, I will spend some time discussing what, in my view, are the most crucial characteristics of a successful monetary policy.
In order to clarify that the Riksbank did not wish to bring inflation back to the target over the normal two-year horizon, the Riksbank decided on this occasion to place particular emphasis on an inflation measure that was not as strongly affected by the fluctuations in energy prices. How has the strategy worked? So how has this strategy worked, i.e. highlighting on different occasions other indices than the CPI as a way of illustrating that there sometimes may be reason to depart from the rule that CPI inflation should be 2 per cent one to two years ahead? With hindsight we can conclude that despite out attempts to be explicit in our communication, it appears that we haven't got our message across in all respects. The strategy does indeed seem to have been successful insofar as we have seldom been asked, especially in the last few years, why the repo rate has not been changed in spite of an inflation forecast that is above or below target. Sometimes, however, and particularly during a couple of months in autumn 2003, the interpretation has been that the Riksbank has "changed target variable". But this has not actually been the case; the inflation target is and has always been defined in terms of the rate of increase in the CPI, even if we've often made it clear that policy in the time horizon in question has been based on a different index, mainly UND1X.

Confidence in the financial markets fell substantially last autumn and credit spreads – the difference between the interest rate on higher risk assets and that on safe assets – rose rapidly. It was initially unclear how large the consequences of the financial turbulence would be for developments in the real economy, but it soon became clear that the consequences were widespread. Credit terms were quickly tightened for companies and households in both the United States and the euro area. Lending growth also slowed down in Sweden. Households and companies went from being relatively optimistic regarding future  1  By bubble, we mean here a development, which if it continues, will evidently not be sustainable in the long term. BIS Review 162/2009  1  developments to being very pessimistic. The global economy entered a recession where demand was falling more quickly than at any other time since the Second World War. Now the financial turbulence has largely subsided as a result of the measures taken by central banks and governments, although the situation in the financial markets can still not be called normal. The global economy has begun to grow again. Although the IMF is assuming that only half of all banks’ losses have been realised, market confidence has recovered and credit spreads have fallen markedly. However, there is still uncertainty over the recovery in the world economy and the sustainability of the improvement that has occurred.
Temporary cut in the interest rate on CHF-denominated loans in order to offset the impact of the stronger CHF May be a valid option, given that both the benchmark rate of the Swiss National Bank and the CHF market rate have reached negative values. C.  Implementing a debt rescheduling scheme, with the award of a compensation by the State Such a solution would be efficient in light of at least four arguments. First and foremost, it would contribute to a higher disposable income of the beneficiaries of this scheme (performing borrowers), with favourable effects on consumption and economic growth. Secondly, it represents a burden-sharing approach among creditors, borrowers and the State. Thirdly, enforcing the relevant law implies favourable effects also in terms of managing the structural liquidity surplus in the banking sector. Fourthly, the measure targets the segment of vulnerable borrowers, with gross monthly incomes of up to lei 3,000, given households’ high degree of indebtedness and its uneven distribution across various income groups. The measure proposed by the Government consists in amending Government Emergency Ordinance 46/2014 by extending its scope of applicability and introducing simpler and more flexible loan rescheduling procedures, and may be applied to CHF-denominated loans as well. The legislative enhancements are aimed at providing some relief to low-income borrowers facing temporary difficulties in repaying their loans, while also improving the mechanism so as to be promoted by banks and requested by eligible debtors.

Within the framework that I have drawn up so far, we forecast inflation, with 70 percent probability, to be between 4.1 percent and 6.9 percent (midpoint 5.5) at the end of 2008, and between 1.8 percent and 5.5 percent (midpoint 3.7) at the end of 2009 (Figure 15). The forecasts are based on the scenario in which policy rates display a limited decline in 2008. Main message of the forecast is that continuation of the gradual easing cycle that started in 2007 September will remain conditional on favorable data and developments. In that sense, the current policy stance envisages a more moderate decline in policy interest rates than indicated in the previous Inflation Report. I would like to emphasize once more that any new data or information on the inflation outlook may lead to a revision in the future policy stance of the Central Bank. Therefore, the policy path that was indicated above should not be perceived as a commitment on behalf of the CBRT. BIS Review 20/2008  11  4. Risks and monetary policy  Distinguished Guests, I would like to dedicate the last part of my speech to the upside and downside risks to the inflation and monetary policy outlook in the upcoming period. The main upside risk factor for the current medium term inflation outlook pertains to the potential second round effects of the accumulated supply shocks, which may also create a higher than expected inflation inertia, as currently manifested in the medium term inflation expectations.
The turnaround had already occurred just over a year ago, but in the period to autumn last year, it appeared that capacity utilisation would gradually decrease to a normal level. As the global economic outlook deteriorated, it became clear that the slowdown in our economy would occur more rapidly and be more pronounced than envisaged earlier. In November, regional network contacts reported an abrupt and marked turnaround in activity. They now report that the labour supply is no longer a constraint on production. The enterprises in the network are expecting output and employment to fall further over the next six months. Unemployment has increased since autumn last year, but is still at historically low levels. Unemployment is projected to rise to almost 5 per cent at the end of the year. Wage growth is expected to come down this year from a high level in 2008. Lower corporate profitability, rising unemployment and lower consumer price inflation will probably result in low negotiated pay increases this year. The export sector has been particularly hard hit by the global downturn. Traditional exports have fallen markedly since autumn last year. A contraction in the world economy will result in a substantial decline in Norwegian exports ahead. Moreover, due to the marked fall in commodity prices, export prices are now very low. A weak krone may help to maintain profitability in Norwegian export enterprises. Expensive and reduced access to credit, high interest expenses and uncertainty about developments ahead amplified the downturn towards the end of 2008.

Activity in the economy will be boosted by strong growth in government spending. The projections are based on the assumption that Norges Bank’s interest rate changes will translate into lower lending rates for households and businesses. At the same time, owing to tighter credit standards in banks, monetary policy appears to be somewhat less effective than normal. Inflation is projected to fall below 2 per cent in 2010, before gradually moving up towards the target towards the end of the projection period as the output gap gradually closes. There is a risk that the structural changes brought about by the crisis may result in persistently lower productivity growth and perhaps higher unemployment. It appears that inflation will remain considerably lower in the years ahead than we expected in December. Both the objective of stabilising inflation around the target and the objective of ensuring stable developments in the real economy suggest that the interest rate should be low. Financial architecture In many countries, banks’ share of GDP has increased considerably over the past few years. This share is smaller in Norway than in other countries and, as a result, the Norwegian economy has been less exposed to the financial crisis. Although banks in Norway have not been as oversized as in many other countries, banking still contributes to fluctuations in our real economy. 4  BIS Review 42/2009  Banking is procyclical. In upturns, loan losses are low, increasing banks’ profits. Access to equity capital is ample, providing the basis for strong lending growth.