samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
The number of transactions, however, has increased far more markedly. One year after the SIC launch, approximately 130,000 transactions were processed each day. Now, twenty years later, an average of 1.3 billion – i.e. ten times more – transactions are carried out per working day. The growth trend for SIC looks set to continue its upward path. The rise in turnover and transactions depends largely on economic growth, technical innovations in payment instruments and developments in the Swiss financial centre. The SNB has partially outsourced its SIC operations. SIC AG, a Telekurs Group company, is responsible for technical operations and for further development of the system. The SNB steers the liquidity in the SIC system, sets the conditions for participation and is responsible for crisis management. Cooperation between SIC AG and the SNB is excellent. The SNB would like to congratulate SIC AG and Telekurs Group on this anniversary and thank them for the outstanding quality of their work. The boards of directors of SWX Group, SIS Group and Telekurs Group have recently signed a declaration of intent regarding the merger of their companies, with the goal of founding a Swiss financial centre infrastructure holding company. SIC AG, or rather Telekurs Group, would be part of this holding company. The SNB is affected by this development in different ways. On the one hand, we are a direct contractual partner of all three companies involved. On the other hand, it is our task to oversee the systemically relevant payments and securities settlement systems.

It surpassed the $ billion mark in just two days, making it the fastest growing ETF in history. 14  For instance, Expedia, Tesla and Microsoft. 15  See “Understanding digital bubbles amidst the COVID-19 pandemic: Evidence from DeFi and NFTs”. Y. Maouchi, L. Charfeddine and G.E. Montasser (2021), Finance Research Letters. 16  The idea behind this strategy is to incentivise investors to lend their crypto-assets to a pool that helps provide liquidity to decentralised finance systems, while offering potential investors the highest possible returns at all times. To simplify somewhat, this strategy is structured around smart contracts that select which environment each of the pooled assets will be sent to at any given moment to optimise economic returns for their rightful holders. 5  where they start posing serious threats to global financial stability17. A message that we also conveyed in our latest Financial Stability Report18. Such risks are diverse in their origin. First, they may arise as a result of a limited understanding by investors on the actual features and implications of these assets on the part of investors.19 By way of example, a recent research from the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) showed that around 20% of crypto-asset owners assumed an equivalent level of customer protection as with traditional banking products.20 An OECD study reached similar conclusions for the Asian market.21 In general terms, given their volatility and complexity, crypto-assets are not appropriate for retail investors.
It is factors such as “economic capital” and the level of competition that drive loan pricing, rather than regulatory capital. Research on the pricing of international syndicated loans has confirmed that “pricing clearly varies positively with credit risk.” That finding should be no surprise to any banker or supervisor – banks that do not price their loans based on a borrower’s credit risk probably will not be in business very long. When applied in the context of sovereign or bank borrowers, this finding suggests that loan pricing already takes into account the credit quality of the borrowers. Studies such as this one have concluded that, consequently, even those countries that have the lowest credit quality will not likely experience a marked contraction in capital flows. Why would that be true? It is because banks that are managing their risks appropriately are already considering all of the risks that they face when they lend to higher risk borrowers – and thus a country’s lower credit quality is already priced into a loan, even under the existing capital rules today. Furthermore, there are additional elements in Basel II that can contribute to alleviate concerns about the impact on capital flows. Let me mention the reduction in capital charges for retail lending, residential mortgages, small and medium enterprises (exposures below € 1 million) and well-provisioned past-due loans.1 Also, the recognition of credit risk mitigants such as collateral and guarantees is significantly better in the new framework of Basel II.

Nina Stoyanova: Opening of “Fintech Summit” Conference Statement by Ms Nina Stoyanova, Deputy Governor and Head of the Banking Department of the Bulgarian National Bank, at the opening of the “Fintech Summit” Conference, organised by Capital newspaper, video conference, 30 March 2021. * * * I would like to welcome you to the annual Fintech Summit organised by Capital Weekly. Until a few years ago the term ‘fintech’ was mainly associated with small innovative companies that by using digital technologies were trying to redefine the provision of financial services and find their own place on the market. Today and even more after the watershed year of 2020, we can assert that technologies and innovations have become an intrinsic feature of the financial sector and a trigger for its rapid developing. Recent trends show expanding cooperation and technical exchange between banks and fintech companies, which is to the benefit of clients, and results in better, faster and more secure services. The coronavirus crisis and expected recovery act as an impetus for further modernisation and digitalisation in response to consumers’ demand and changes in society. In this context, the ambitions for accelerated reforms were also confirmed by the European Commission in the ‘EU Digital Finance Strategy’ and the ‘EU Retail Payments Strategy’ published in September 2020. Almost half a year after their launch, we can already note the first concrete steps in the implementation of the goals set in these strategies.
Given the fact that the policy rate is an inadequate tool to deal with overleverage, excessive risk taking, or apparent deviations of asset prices from fundamentals, there are other instruments at the policymaker’s disposal: countercyclical regulatory tools. Thus, if leverage appears excessive, regulatory capital ratios can be increased; if liquidity appears too low, regulatory liquidity ratios can be introduced and, if needed, increased; to dampen housing prices, loan-to-value ratios can be decreased; to limit stock price increases, margin requirements can be increased. As I said earlier, the NBR has always had to juggle the “three aspects of stability” and that called for the deployment of alternative instruments, such as the full use of the reserve requirement ratios and recourse to administrative measures. Reserve requirement ratios were increased up to 20 and 40 percent for lei- and forex-denominated liabilities respectively, and the list of administrative measures included: enforcing a maximum loan-to-value ratio, introducing debt service ceilings relative to households’ monthly disposable income, setting limits on banks’ forex exposure vis-à-vis unhedged borrowers, using differentiated coefficients in stress tests (higher for exposures to EUR than lei, with even stricter coefficients for CHF- and USD-denominated credit). Even though at the time our modus operandi was seen as deviating from the orthodoxy of central banking, during the global crisis or in its aftermath, macroprudential instruments are now part of the mainstream and forex interventions re-entered the arsenal of many central banks, including some of those using a free floating regime before the crisis.

The pandemic is also likely to have lasting economic eﬀects beyond 2021, including postponed investments, the negative impact of sustained job losses on human capital, global supply chain reconfigurations that emphasise resilience over eﬀiciency, and high public and private debt levels. These eﬀects will further threaten potential growth in economies globally. 6. However, Asian economies are poised to overcome these challenges. Our growth model which comprises deep international integration, investment in human capital, and sound economic governance has helped us weather past crises and will continue to serve us well. The digitalisation of the regional economy also oﬀers immense opportunities. It is facilitating the growth of emerging industries such as e-commerce and expanding access to the vast East Asian market for non-traded goods. 7. In the medium term, Asia’s outlook is positive. In the next five years, the IMF projects 5.2% average annual growth for the region, compared to 3.2% for the rest of the world. By 2025, Asia’s share of global GDP is expected to reach 38%, up from 26% 20 years ago. [4] Financial Markets in Asia – Sharing the growth story 8. Asian financial markets have grown in tandem with the Asian economic growth trajectory.
3  3  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/speeches  3  The varied colour of our banknotes also plays an important role in making the nation’s money as inclusive as possible. Features like the differing colour palettes, differing sizes and raised print enable those who are visually impaired to recognise different notes. As with the new polymer £ the new £ will also include a tactile feature – a series of raised dots in the upper left-hand corner – to improve accessibility further. Conclusion Banknotes are meagre pieces of paper – or more accurately polymer – of no intrinsic value that serve vital economic functions. They facilitate trade. They store value. They act as a unit of account. As the man whom Turner will replace on the £ Adam Smith observed, banknotes may be mere barren tokens but they are the “universal instrument of commerce”.5 And money serves as a collective memory for a country and its people; it has cultural value as well as economic. As the new Turner £ testifies, money can be a work of art in everyone’s pocket. Far from being “barren”, 6 our banknotes celebrate UK’s heritage, salute its culture and testify to the great achievements of its most notable citizens.

With the promising economic potentials ahead of us, I would like to reemphasize our shared vision of “What we shall expect to see for the future of the Greater Mekong Subregion” and “How we can achieve such prosperity.” 4. I picture the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) in the next twenty years as a much more connected and integrated region: a region where we are not only connected solely by a river, but by various modes of transportation, where one can travel conveniently, where trade and investment can flow across efficiently, and where prosperity can be widely enjoyed even by those in the rural areas. Although we are not yet there, I strongly believe that this vision can come true. 5. We always hear the saying “Rome was not built in a day”. Thus, we have to start working together towards our shared vision starting today. There is a great deal of preparatory work to be done; but in my view, some of the most crucial tasks are infrastructure development and businesses access to funds. The first task is channelling intraregional funds to infrastructure projects, followed by the second task of promoting economic growth and equality within the region through enhancing financial markets and supporting private financing. Ladies and Gentlemen, 6. Let me highlight key issues on the first preparatory work, which is financing infrastructure development. The ADB has already committed at least 9 billion US dollars1 to fund its GMS development projects in the pipeline.
In February 1929, Josiah Stamp went to Paris as a member of the Young Committee to assess whether the reparations debts run up by Germany could be repaid – the similarities with the present situation in Europe are too poignant to dwell on. In a letter to Keynes, Stamp compared these international meetings to a conjuror trying to pull a rabbit out of the hat: “It is still a madhouse, in a way – but all are mad in a very genteel way, the main occupation being elaborate proofs, from different angles, of sanity. One half sit round a hat saying with Coué reiteration: there is a rabbit – there is. The other half try to make a noise like a succulent lettuce. There is a general conviction that the more eminent the conjurors convened, the more certainty is there of the existence of the rabbit”. 33 The only escape from madness is the power of ideas. Today, we understand less than we would wish about how the economy works. The challenge of trying to understand more, and of developing those new ideas, belongs to you – the next generation of students and academics at the LSE and elsewhere. Go to it! 33  Stamp’s letter is reprinted in the collected works of J.M.Keynes volume XVIII, p.306-7, Macmillan 1978. Émile Coué was a French psychologist who developed a popular method of psychotherapy based on optimistic autosuggestion. He would have been right at home in modern economic policy debates.

BIS central bankers’ speeches  11  Annex: Tables and charts  10  BIS central bankers’ speeches  BIS central bankers’ speeches  11  12  BIS central bankers’ speeches  BIS central bankers’ speeches  13  14  BIS central bankers’ speeches  BIS central bankers’ speeches  15  16  BIS central bankers’ speeches  BIS central bankers’ speeches  17  References Adrian, T and H. Shin (2011), “Financial Intermediaries and Monetary Economics”, Handbook of Monetary Economics 3A pp. 601–650, Elsevier. Barker, K., (2003), “Adjusting to low inflation – issues for policy”, available at http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Documents/speeches/2003/speech190.pdf . Barker, K., (2012), “Macroeconomic policy: too much autonomy and too little coordination”, Centreforum, available at www.centreforum.org/assets/pubs/macroeconomic-policy.pdf . Bean, C., (2003), “Asset Prices, Financial Imbalances and Monetary Policy: Are Inflation Targets Enough?” in Anthony Richards and Timothy Robinson (eds.) Asset Prices and Monetary Policy, pp. 48-76. Reserve Bank of Australia: Sydney. Bean, C., M. Paustian, A. Penalver, and T. Taylor, (2010), “Monetary Policy after the Fall” In Macroeconomic Challenges: The Decade Ahead. Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. Bernanke, B., (2011), “The Effects of the Great Recession on Central Bank Doctrine and Practice”, remarks at the 56th Economic Conference of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, 18 October 2011. Bernanke, B., and M. Gertler, (1989) “Agency Costs, Net Worth, and Business Fluctuations”, American Economic Review, Vol. 79(1), pp. 14–31. Bernanke, B., and M. Gertler, (1990), “Financial Fragility and Economic Performance”, Quarterly Journal of Economics 105, pp. 87–114.
Ardian Fullani: Promoting a public debate around the new economic growth model Speech by Mr Ardian Fullani, Governor of the Bank of Albania, at the Meeting with AgroBusiness and Banking Sector Representatives, Lushnja, 13 March 2014. *  *  *  Dear guests, It is a great pleasure for me to be here today to discuss one of the most important sectors of the Albanian economy – agriculture. Moreover, the fact that this meeting takes place in one of the areas with extraordinary potential for the development of this sector – I am referring here not only to Lushnja, but the entire Fier district – is very significant. I do not think I am surprising anyone, particularly those engaged daily with entrepreneurship, when I state that the recent years’ global economic crisis had an easily recognisable impact on the Albanian economy as well. The pace of economic growth has slowed markedly, particularly in the past two years. According to the latest forecasts, the Albanian economy is expected to pick up slightly in the next few years due to improved monetary and financial conditions, and the fact that our trading neighbours are, similar to Albania, showing the first signs of recovery after several years. However, we expect growth to remain weak for a while yet compared to the pre-crisis period. Under these circumstances, the Bank of Albania has been promoting a public debate around the new economic growth model, even before this global financial crisis took hold.

During the 2000s, the Albanian economy was most focused on non-traded sectors like construction, and hotels and tourism, with a low share in the growth of productivity. Improving them and successfully facing competition in the international markets should lie at the core of Albania’s new economic growth model. Bank of Albania’s analyses suggest that these structural changes will contribute to recovering the economy at a faster pace in the years ahead and restoring the previous growth rates. The agriculture sector meets the above criteria to lie at the core of this new model better than any other economic sector. On the other hand, we must recognise that despite Albania’s vast natural resources, we have not managed to fully utilise these potential resources for the agriculture sector to face competition in the international markets. The Bank of Albania sees great potential in agriculture, which, for a number of reasons, could not materialise in the past years but can become more beneficial in the future. Unlike other sectors, whose future benefits may be limited, agriculture may represent an important source for a second period of dynamic economic growth. The Albanian economy should be re-oriented towards those sectors whose capacity to compete in the international markets is the best signal for the development potential. The Albanian economy being a net importer of food products hints at a low level of competitiveness and represents one of the major future challenges.
The existence of a liquidity premium results in an understatement of the level of expected inflation derived from the break-even inflation rate. Some in-house research suggests this bias to be at around 5 to 15 basis points. Besides these technical biases, institutional arrangements may also introduce distortions in real yields, which impact in turn on the break-even inflation rate. I will mention two examples. Institutional biases The tax bias: the main source of distortion is probably related to taxation. Investors are primarily interested in real net-of-tax cash flows, which implies that differences in tax treatment between conventional and indexed bonds will influence their relative prices and therefore the break-even inflation rate. In the French case, where inflation compensation gains and interest rate income are equally taxed, this bias is generally considered as relatively small - less than 10 basis points. But even if it is small, it constitutes another upward distortion in the break-even. New regulations - supply and demand factors: as I mentioned, earlier, and I will conclude this section by this point, the French OATi, which so far has been the main inflation-indexed indicator used by the ECB in its economic and financial assessment, has been distorted by a significant upward demand shift which can be, to a certain extent, attributed to the adoption by the French Banking and Finance Regulation Committee (CRBF) of a new regulation on Livret A (passbook saving vehicle), aiming at linking this savings account partly to inflation .

The American and British experiences underscore that recovery is not possible without a meaningful and transparent re-capitalisation of the banking system, and that households need to de-lever before they have the confidence to consume again. 1  60,000 jobs per month in the UK is roughly the equivalent of monthly increases in US non-farm payrolls of 300,000. BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  The question now is whether such progress is sufficient for durable, strong and balanced recoveries over the medium term. Growing pessimism The pessimists would argue that it isn’t. Their case starts from the observation that advanced economy growth rates remain below pre-crisis trends, despite the scale of the fall and years of emergency monetary stimulus. More fundamentally, pessimists point to the pre-crisis period when (retrospectively) loose financial conditions did not generate a boom in output and associated inflation. They ask: could stagnation be the new normal? Today I want to consider two possible explanations for why advanced economies may have entered a low growth phase. First, on the demand side, they could be in a persistent liquidity trap, making it difficult for resources to be fully utilized, and second, there may have been a persistent deterioration in the supply side such that full utilisation of resources is consistent with slower growth. 1. Persistent liquidity trap  A liquidity trap occurs when the short-term nominal interest rate hits the zero lower bound.
One area I might be slightly—but not particularly—worried about is financial market asset valuations, which I would characterize as elevated. While valuations are noteworthy, I am less concerned than I might be otherwise because the economy’s performance and outlook seem consistent with what we see in financial markets. Volatility in the real economy has been low, and this has been matched by low volatility in financial markets, which has helped support high valuations. I am also less worried because the financial system today is much more resilient and robust than it was a decade ago. Thus, even if financial asset prices were to decline significantly—which presumably would occur if the economic outlook were to deteriorate—I don’t think such declines would have the destructive impact we saw a decade ago. Higher capital and liquidity requirements for major banks have made the banking system more resilient and better able to absorb market shocks without this impairing its ability to intermediate credit flows between borrowers and savers. It was the collapse of confidence in the financial system in 2008 that caused credit availability to dry up, contributing greatly to the severity of the Great Recession.7 So, what am I worried about? Two macroeconomic concerns warrant mention. The first is the risk of economic overheating. Now, this seems like an odd issue to focus on when inflation is low, but it strikes me that this is a real risk over the next few years.

Not only do we have an 4/6  BIS central bankers' speeches  economy that is growing at an above-trend pace—at a time when the labor market is already quite tight—but the economy will be getting an extra boost in 2018 and 2019 from the recently enacted tax legislation. Moreover, even though the FOMC has raised its target range for the federal funds rate by 125 basis points over the past two years, financial conditions today are easier than when we started to remove monetary policy accommodation. This suggests that the Federal Reserve may have to press harder on the brakes at some point over the next few years. If that happens, the risk of a hard landing will increase. Historically, the Federal Reserve has found it difficult to achieve a soft landing—especially when the unemployment rate has fallen below the rate consistent with stable inflation. In those circumstances, the Federal Reserve has been unable to both push up the unemployment rate slightly to a level that is consistent with stable inflation and avoid recession.8 Now, I don’t want to imply that a recession is inevitable once the FOMC finds it necessary to nudge up the unemployment rate to a sustainable level. The starting point in terms of the inflation rate is also important because it will influence how far the FOMC is likely to go in terms of making monetary policy tight. Nevertheless, I think it is fair to say that the track record on this score is not encouraging.