samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
In other words, ECB actions that support market confidence are of benefit not only to countries in difficulty, but also to the euro area as a whole. Our measures ensure the proper transmission of monetary policy, which means neither excessively high interest rates nor excessively low interest rates. The measures enable the ECB to continue to maintain price stability for the benefit of all citizens of the euro area. The announcement on OMTs has already triggered positive effects. Sentiment in financial markets has improved significantly. Excessive government bond spreads have gone down, a number of banks in stressed countries have been able to regain access to markets and Target2 balances have broadly stabilised. The way forward Let me draw to a close. Actions by the ECB can build confidence in the euro area in the near term. But only actions by governments can secure confidence in the euro area over the longer term. In particular, governments need to work together to establish a stronger institutional structure for the euro area. 4  BIS central bankers’ speeches  This process began in June this year with what has been called the “Four Presidents’ Report”. That report – of which I am a co-author – identified four key pillars on which a stable and prosperous monetary union should be built. These pillars are financial union, fiscal union, economic union and political union. In the near term, the most important pillar is financial union.

Joseph Yam: Asia’s ability to cope with the continuing challenges of globalisation Statement by Mr Joseph Yam, Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority and Alternate Governor on the Board of Directors of the Asian Development Bank, at the 37th Asian Development Bank Annual Meeting, Jeju Island, Korea, 15-17 May 2004. *  *  *  Mr President, I join other Governors in: first, thanking the Government and the people of the Republic of Korea for their warm hospitality in hosting this year’s Annual Meeting; secondly, thanking the Bank’s management and staff for the excellent arrangements made; and thirdly, welcoming our two new members - Luxembourg and Palau. Mr President, on the governance of the Bank, I would like to commend the Bank for adopting a number of reform initiatives in the past year to enhance accountability and efficacy of operations. Greater transparency and accountability in all aspects of the Bank’s operation is to be welcomed. Measuring, monitoring and managing development results are essential. The creation of the independent Operations Evaluation Department will enhance the credibility of the Bank’s achievements. These initiatives will put the Bank in a stronger position in meeting the many tasks ahead. On the region, Mr President, I would like to focus just on the continuing challenges arising from globalisation and the ability, or rather the lack of ability, of Asia in coping with them. The Asian financial turmoil of 1997-98 demonstrated this vehemently.
Pay distributions between whites and ethnic minorities show fewer differences. Chart 5: Distribution of hourly pay by gender and ethnicity  Source: ONS Labour Force Survey and Bank of England calculations. 9  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches  9  Chart 6 plots the mean hourly pay by decile for different ethnicity and gender groups. In 1997, white males earned more than all other groups, on average, across the entire distribution. The same is broadly true in 2018, except that ethnic minority males now earn more in the top decile. Females continue to earn less than males right across the distribution. The difference between white females and ethnic minority females is relatively small across the distribution. Chart 6: Mean hourly pay by decile for ethnicity and gender interaction groups  Source: ONS Labour Force Survey and Bank of England calculations. (c)  Unconditional gender and ethnicity pay gaps  Unconditional gender and ethnicity pay gaps are calculated as the difference between median male (white) gross hourly earnings and median female (non-white) earnings, divided by median male (white) earnings.8 As with published pay gaps for companies, these measures make no attempt, at this stage, to control for factors driving or explaining these gaps; they are unconditional pay gaps. The unconditional gender pay gap is large over the sample, averaging just over 22% (Chart 7). This gap has shrunk over the past 25 years, from around 30% in the mid-1990s to around 20% in 2018.

A negative pay gap in this table indicates that ethnic minorities earn less than their white counterparts, whereas a positive pay gap indicates that ethnic minorities earn more than their white counterparts. 29  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches  29  We can extend these specifications by considering interaction effects between gender and ethnicity. This is achieved by adding two dummy variables to the original specification (5):  (8) ln  ∝  Where  ∗  ∗  h  =  h  1 0  ∗  ∗  h  ∗  person does not belong to white ethnic group person belongs to white ethnic group  As shown in Table 4, we find that the conditional gender wage gap (for white women) remains around -15%. For female ethnic minorities this becomes larger at around -18%, suggesting an additional “pay bias”. This resolves another puzzle in the unconditional pay data. By contrast, ethnic minority men suffer no such additional bias. Indeed, at around -10 percentage points, their pay gap is smaller than for white women.
BIS Review 76/2009  3  their decisions to spend on durable goods, awaiting uncertainty to clear up. Households, however, would continue to spend on non-durables. Actually, the share of goods like foodstuff in the total consumption basket would increase. Durable and investment goods, meanwhile, are the ones subject to this wait and see strategy and, by their own nature, their purchase can be postponed. Thus, there are two possible equilibria: B and C, both with output below the original level A. Furthermore, we can think that in case C the loss of confidence is very big, which magnifies the fall in demand that may result from a cyclical adjustment. In such a case pessimism dominates. Everyone thinks that economic activity will fall due to increased uncertainty and that is exactly what happens, so pessimism is justified. This point is more general: facing multiple equilibria, how do private expectations coordinate for the economy to converge to one or the other? Evidently there is no natural mechanism, so failed coordination can easily lead the economy to settle in the worst equilibrium. The exercise I have presented is pretty simple and it surely overlooks many relevant aspects, especially the dynamics that might allow us to analyze the loss of confidence. It is still helpful because it explains why the increase in uncertainty triggered by the deterioration in output and the financial crisis deepens the fall in output, whose effects can be substantial.

Let me proceed, then, by showing you what has been happening in the world and in Chile and how we can observe the increase in uncertainty in agents’ expectations and its propagation around the globe. The global crisis of confidence I will start by listing the main aspects I will be focusing on: •  The synchrony of this crisis is unprecedented. The drop in output made no distinction among economies’ strengths or weaknesses. •  Global uncertainty and distrust were particularly acute towards the end of last year. •  The severe drop in demand was concentrated largely in durable goods. Investment and consumption of these products collapsed by the end of 2008. To contextualize this episode, I will begin by recalling that a debate about the accumulation of strong global imbalances had been going on for several years, focusing on their implications and ways to correct them. The Central Bank of Chile identified them as a significant risk in many of its Monetary Policy Reports. Meanwhile, the world proceeded with very unusual dynamism. World GDP grew by an annual average of nearly 5 percent between 2004 and 2007, while commodity prices increased manifold. Copper, for instance, went from selling at about $ per pound in late 2003 to approaching and even briefly surpassing $ during April and July 2008. Oil went from trading at around 30 to 35 dollars per barrel in late 2003 to close to 150 dollars last July.
A large proportion of the transit travel from the north to the south of Europe goes right through Switzerland. In order to make this more efficient, we are currently digging a 57-kilometer-long railway tunnel through the Gotthard Mountain - an undertaking that is going to cost Switzerland a lot of money. So I hope that it will manage to be the longest railway tunnel in the world for a few years at least. The country’s economic relations with the European Union are governed by the Bilateral Agreements this comes after the electorate voted against Switzerland’s accession to the European Economic Area in 1992. Agreements in seven sectors have been in force since mid-2002; a further eight agreements were signed by the EU and Switzerland just three weeks ago. These now need to be approved by parliament or, if necessary, by the people. Opening up the Swiss labour market vis-à-vis the EU is of particular importance. For our country, the enlargement of the workforce through the immigration of foreign nationals has long been crucial, given its own limited labour potential. Earlier arrangements were customised to suit the needs of certain sectors, notably the construction, tourism and agricultural industries. However, since the bilateral agreement on the free movement of persons entered into force two years ago, the Swiss labour market has been open to EU citizens. And vice-versa - Swiss nationals seeking employment are free to work anywhere in the European Union. There are, however, still quotas in place. These will be removed in 2007.

WIBC Asia provides a valuable platform to bring together stakeholders in Islamic finance, from Asia and the Middle East, to foster stronger collaboration for sustained industry growth. I wish you fruitful discussions. Thank you. 2  BIS central bankers’ speeches
The so-called vulnerable groups, which according to the Swedish Public Employment Service will have difficulty finding work, include, for instance, young people with little education and people born outside of Europe. As shown in Figure 5, the percentage of people registered as unemployed and belonging to vulnerable groups rose in 2008 and 2009. This percentage has since remained at a level that is much higher than for groups with a stronger position. 11  See Statistics Sweden’s report “Integration – a regional perspective”, 2010. BIS central bankers’ speeches  9  Figure 5 Total unemployment broken down into vulnerable and non-vulnerable groups Percentage of register-based labour force, seasonally-adjusted and trend-adjusted statistics 12  12  Vulnerable Non-vulnerable Total  10  10  8  8  6  6  4  4  2  2  0  0 04  05  06  07  08  09  10  11  Note: The group of vulnerable people includes those with only secondary-school level education, those in the age range 55–64, those born outside Europe, and those with disabilities. Source: Swedish Public Employment Service  Despite the recovery in economic activity in 2010 and 2011, the percentage of employed in the most vulnerable groups thus hardly declined at all. Almost 60 per cent of the total number of persons registered as unemployed belongs to groups in the labour market that experience difficulty finding jobs quickly.

Christian Noyer: Central banks in the financial crisis – a European perspective Speech by Mr Christian Noyer, Governor of the Bank of France and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Bank for International Settlements, at the Bank of Korea International Conference, Seoul, 1 June 2010. *  *  *  Introduction Ladies and gentlemen, It’s a great pleasure for me to address such a distinguished audience. First, let me thank the organizers of the conference for giving me the opportunity to open this second day of the conference. Yesterday’s contributions have been outstanding and, in view of our program I have very high expectations for our discussions of today. From the outset, Central Banks have been major actors in fighting the financial crisis. Overall their actions have been broadly successful. In the period to come, however, steering the economy may prove more challenging and new risks can weigh negatively on the recovery underway. A case in point is the brutal reassessment of sovereign risks by market participants. The euro-area has been at the epicentre of this phenomenon. Some market segments have become dysfunctional to a point that jeopardized the transmission of monetary policy. The Eurosystem has therefore resorted to new steps to contain those tensions and prevent their spill over to the real economy. The sovereign debt turmoil is the most recent episode of a crisis that started already more than two years ago.
Such investment will also afford banks a greater guarantee of success when addressing the growing competition from technology firms. Likewise, these investments are needed to mitigate the impact and probability of cyber risks, which we have identified as a growing threat. Fourth, let us not forget that there are also various challenges in the regulatory and institutional arenas, both globally and at the European level. The coming months will be key to ensuring the full adoption of the Basel III accord in Europe. This will enable us to remain at the forefront of the multilateral response to this crisis and to establish, within Europe, the benefits that proper banking regulation has for economies’ capacity to absorb shocks and foster the public’s well-being. Moreover, the COVID-19 crisis has once again reminded us of the pressing need to complete the Banking Union and strengthen the Capital Markets Union. The creation of a common European Deposit Insurance Scheme and the adoption of appropriate panEuropean resolution legislation for large institutions are key steps in this process, paving the way for cross-border mergers and acquisitions and the associated potential efficiency gains, for instance. Thus, further integration of the European financial system would open up greater risk diversification possibilities and facilitate financing for productive activities at a lower cost. Lastly, in the longer term, it will also be important that the banking sector provides an appropriate response to the risks posed by climate change.

Accordingly, we envisage inflation to decline until September, and increase slightly in September due to base effects. Then, following a fluctuating course, we project that it will reach 6.9 percent in the year-end. In addition to these forecasts, we discuss alternative scenarios on the inflation outlook and the global economy in the Risks section of the Inflation Report. You can examine the Report for details. While concluding my remarks, I would like to thank all my colleagues who contributed to the Report, primarily those at the Research and Monetary Policy Department as well as the members of the Monetary Policy Committee, and thank every one of you for your participation. BIS central bankers’ speeches  5  6  BIS central bankers’ speeches  BIS central bankers’ speeches  7  8  BIS central bankers’ speeches  BIS central bankers’ speeches  9  10  BIS central bankers’ speeches  BIS central bankers’ speeches  11
The above reasoning is of a highly principle nature and it would require further analysis and better models before anything more concrete can be said regarding the manner in which monetary policy should be formulated when financial imbalances are present. However, I am prepared to make a few observations on the subject. To start with, there are probably many asset bubbles that monetary policy should not directly attempt to counteract, particularly those not associated with strong credit growth. Furthermore, Swedish monetary policy can hardly prevent stock market bubbles as these are primarily affected by international factors, in particular international stock market developments. If, on the other hand, credit growth were to develop in an unsustainable manner at the same time as housing prices were increasing rapidly, in my opinion, it would be reasonable for monetary policy to take this into consideration, even if short-term inflation may be low. Such considerations characterised the formulation of monetary policy during the years 2005– 2007, when the development of housing prices and loans to households restrained the Riksbank from cutting the repo rate as much as would have been the case if monetary policy had only been guided by inflationary assessments for the next two years. It is, of course, difficult to determine which role this played in counteracting the development of the housing market. At any rate, prices undeniably rose rapidly.

Much reflection has also been carried out on the matter within the Swiss National Bank in order to better understand this difficult period in our own history. The postwar period was characterised by a fierce determination to start afresh, to avoid the reappearance of the misleading thinking that had led to pre-war protectionism, and to reconstruct the economies that lay in ruins. A phase of intensive work began, with the aim of reorganising the international monetary order. Still isolated, both economically and politically, Switzerland participated in the efforts without becoming a member of the Bretton Woods Institutions. The gradual liberalisation  BIS Review 40/2007  3  of payments and trade rapidly led to a period of prosperity but also to a situation of disequilibrium in the operation of the international monetary system. Inflation and speculative movements of funds became common features during the 1960s and the monetary arena was disturbed by multiple devaluations, particularly in Europe. Suspension of gold convertibility for the dollar, in 1971, hailed the collapse of the system of fixed exchange rates that had been put into place after the war. Faced with a massive flow of speculative funds, the SNB was forced to abandon stabilisation of the Swiss franc in 1973. The transition to sustained floating for the Swiss franc was definitely the most important change of direction in the monetary policy strategy pursued by our bank in its hundred years of existence.
Average annual inflation was 3.1% in the first quarter of the year, dropping by 0.4 percentage points from its average level of the third quarter and getting closer to Bank of Albania’s target. During 2010, inflation was influenced by increased administered prices, rising trend of basic goods prices, food products and oil prices in international markets, and underestimating tendencies of the exchange rate. Annual inflation increase to 3.4% in December was due to increased agricultural products prices, reflecting this increase in global markets. Yet, anchored expectations on price stability and disinflation pressures by the real economy balanced the action of the above-mentioned factors of demand on inflation, halting their transition to second round effects and stable inflation pressures. The Bank of Albania considers that the inflation rate is expected to range within our target of 3 per cent, during the entire year. The increasing effect on the inflation of supply factors is balanced by the negative output gap and existence of non-utilised capacities in the economy. Controlled inflation pressures and fiscal policy created space for a gradual increase of the monetary stimulus in the economy during 2010. The Supervisory Council of the Bank of Albania decided to reduce the key interest rate by 00.25 percentage points in July, taking it to the lowest historical level of 5.0%. In parallel with this move, the Bank of Albania supplied the interbank market with the necessary liquidity for a proper functioning of financial markets.

Ardian Fullani: Recent economic and financial developments in Albania Speech by Mr Ardian Fullani, Governor of the Bank of Albania, at the press conference on Bank of Albania (BoA) Supervisory Council decisions on Monetary Policy, Tirana, 26 January 2011. *  *  *  In its meeting of 26 January 2011, the Supervisory Council of the Bank of Albania reviewed and approved the Monetary Policy Report for the second half of 2010. Following a thorough analysis of Albania’s latest economic and financial developments and discussions on performance outlook, the Supervisory Council of the Bank of Albania decided to keep the key interest rate unchanged at 5.00%. The Council holds that current monetary conditions are appropriate for meeting the medium-term inflation target. I will proceed with a brief overview of economic developments and key issues discussed at today’s meeting that led to this decision. * * *  The Albanian economy recorded a positive development during the second half of 2010. The economic activity continued to mark growth, while main macroeconomic balances improved and risk premium and interest rates in financial markets decreased. The economic growth during 2010 relied mainly on foreign demand for Albanian goods and services, while domestic consumption and investments remained at low levels albeit positive developments. Inflation pressures remain controlled as a result of the existence of free capacities in the economy and anchored inflation expectations.