samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
It will in general not be possible to specify a written contract which can cover all possible contingencies and which could be verified unambiguously ex post. Moreover, there are limits to the extent to which the behaviour of individuals inside an institution can be monitored and verified precisely from the outside. Ultimately, the assessment of performance can only be based on observable and verifiable outcomes of decisions, which - however - will also be affected by many other exogenous influences. Especially in cases where decision-making is done by committee - as is the case for the majority of independent central banks - it is rather difficult to disentangle individual contributions and responsibilities with respect to the common decisions taken. Delegating authority and placing trust in institutions which are assigned a clear objective seems preferable to relying on the discretion and good faith of individuals, on the one hand, and imposing strict mechanical rules, on the other hand. Any institution is more than the mere sum of individuals. This is the very reason for the existence of institutions - otherwise there would be no need for them. Institutions instil and reflect a sense of common purpose and responsibility. They provide a discipline on individual behaviour within such an institution. At the same time they provide support and strength to the individuals making up the institution. The strength of an institutional approach is particularly evident in the case of independent central banks. In this context, I believe, there are great merits in decision-making by committee.

The Treaty was ratified by the parliaments and governments of all Member States of the European Union and in some cases endorsed by referendum. Thus the delegation of European monetary policy to the ECB is endowed with full democratic legitimacy. This bond of legitimacy is a crucial aspect of sound institutional foundations for monetary policy. There is no doubt that in order to be successful over the longer term, the ECB as the guardian of price stability - like any institution in a democracy will have to win and maintain the trust and support of the European public. It can and should be held accountable for fulfilling its mandate. This mandate is clear, but it is also limited. It needs to be understood what monetary policy can be expected to deliver, but also what it cannot be expected to achieve. This is particular important in the case of the European Monetary Union, which not only delegates the authority for monetary policy to an independent central bank but which also severs the traditionally close link between the currency and the nation state. Historically, currency jurisdictions and national borders have tended to coincide, at least in more recent times. This reflects the fact that the right to issue money has been seen as a key attribute of national sovereignty. Thus monetary union cannot be regarded as just a small and innocuous step of a primarily technical nature.
It is likely that continued strong growth in output and employment will result in a higher rise in prices and costs, but it may take time. According to Statistics Norway’s Labour Force Survey (LFS), employment growth picked up markedly towards the end of 2005 and into 2006. LFS unemployment fell further in January, while the number of registered unemployed was approximately unchanged in March. Measured in per cent of the labour force, seasonally adjusted LFS unemployment was 3.9 per cent. The labour supply is also being influenced by an increase in inward labour migration from the new EU accession countries. These changes are difficult to measure in official labour market statistics. The Central Office – Foreign Tax Affairs recorded an increase of about 7400 employees from the new EU accession countries from 2004 to 2005. This figure covers employees in both Norwegian and foreign enterprises. The size of the actual supply of labour behind these figures is uncertain, because there is  BIS Review 35/2006  1  no information about the duration of such employment relationships. On balance, however, there are signs that the use of foreign labour has contributed to dampening pressures on real economic resources through the upturn. The effect has probably been largest in the construction industry, as evidenced in particular by continued moderate wage growth last year, despite very high activity. The figures for the first quarter of this year indicate that inward labour migration is still rising. There is competition for the best labour in the EU countries.

Futures prices have also risen markedly, indicating expectations of a sustained increase in metal prices similar to the increase in oil prices. Prices for fresh farmed salmon have also exhibited a pronounced rise. Rising commodity prices and buoyant activity in markets that are important for Norway have fuelled growth in the Norwegian economy, even though growth has been low in some of Norway’s most important export markets. Overall, prices for our imported goods are falling in relation to prices for goods we export. Norway’s terms of trade are improving. The impact of the rise in oil and gas prices is particularly strong, but the terms-of-trade gains for the mainland economy have also been high. The domestic economy is partly insulated thanks to the oil fund mechanism. The situation in Norway differs from that of its Nordic neighbour countries. Sales of Swedish and Finnish high-tech products are growing strongly in volume terms, but prices are falling. Denmark has a diversified business sector, which is overall moving on a steady path. Growth among our trading partners remains solid. High commodity prices are exerting upward pressure on consumer price inflation in a number of countries, although underlying inflation remains low. Economic growth in the US probably picked up again in the first quarter. In Japan, growth appears to be solid. In the euro area, confidence indicators point to optimism in the business sector. There is a broad-based expansion in the Swedish economy, while some indicators in the UK have shown weak developments.
The IMF worked out a proposal for debt consolidation a few years ago, entitled Sovereign Debt Restructuring Mechanism (SDRM), but the proposal has not won general approval in this form and the problem of managing sovereign states’ payment problems remains. The example of Argentina showed clearly the need for a framework that could, for instance, solve the current problem of a risk of different borrower groups receiving different treatment, with various “clubs” for different types of loan. It is possible that we can get the ball rolling with a lucky name change to Framework for Orderly Restructuring of Debt (FORD). Ford owns Volvo and Volvo means “I roll”. 2  This example is taken from a lecture given by the World Bank’s chief economist Nicholas Stern (now at HM Treasury in the UK) at Munich University in November 2002. 3  Collective action clauses are a means of clarifying at the time the loan agreement is signed how the contract will be renegotiated if the borrower cannot pay according to the agreed amortisation and interest rate plan. 6  BIS Review 60/2004  Conclusion There is still a lot we do not know about the growth process, but fortunately the knowledge gaps appear to be dwindling as time goes by.

Mark Twain is supposed to have once said: “I’m all for progress; it’s change I don’t like.” However, change lies in the nature of market liberalism, which neither can nor should be stationary. The structural changes that come in the wake of globalisation mean that less efficient production is replaced by more efficient production, and that sectors that do not hold up in competition are replaced by sectors where the country has comparative advantages, that is to say, is relatively better than its competitors. Structural changes thus consist of two parts: closing down (or moving out) and new establishment of businesses. The Austrian economist Joseph Schumpeter called this creative destruction; old jobs and technologies disappear and new, more productive jobs arise as technology develops and production becomes more specialised. The major challenge in future, in both Sweden and other industrialised nations, will therefore be to create dynamic conditions in which new jobs can arise as the old ones disappear due to rationalisation or are moved abroad. Studies regarding some industrial nations indicate that many jobs lost during the most recent economic slowdown have not yet been replaced by new jobs in the same branch when economic activity picked up again; instead productivity has been higher. However, employment has continued to increase in other sectors, which appears to increase the number of jobs regardless of economic activity. The fact that employees have to change sector leads to greater friction unemployment arising.
Third, despite record low mortgage interest rates, the depressed housing market remains a significant impediment.1 While house prices are no longer overvalued by historical standards, restrictions on access to credit and the large number of homes in the foreclosure pipeline means that home prices remain under downward pressure. The ongoing weakness in housing makes achieving a vigorous economic recovery more difficult for several reasons:   The strong rebound in housing construction and related activities, such as furniture sales, that typically power economic recoveries following deep recessions is absent.   The decline in home prices has eroded household wealth, which then inhibits consumer spending. Since home values peaked in 2006, homeowners have lost more than half their home equity and many expect further declines.   The weakness in home prices has reduced credit availability because many households and small businesses use their homes as their primary source of collateral for loans. 1  See Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, 2012 White Paper, “The U.S. Housing Market: Current Conditions and Policy Considerations” and “Housing and the Economic Recovery” by William Dudley. 2  BIS central bankers’ speeches    The big drop in house prices has made it more difficult for borrowers to refinance, undercutting some of monetary policy’s ability to support demand. In a recent speech I discussed some policy interventions that could help to stabilize the housing market. I will not discuss this further as our focus today is on education.

These three sources of risk call for different policy actions. The first approach for dealing with asset price misalignments is for authorities to communicate their views on the extent of potential asset price distortions and their consequences for financial stability. These “verbal interventions” are relatively common regarding the exchange rate. I see no reason why we should not use them also for other assets such as bonds and equity, since they are relevant variables from the point of view of macroeconomic and financial stability. Indeed, recent experience has shown that central banks need to be more assertive and communicative about the conduct of financial systems. In our last Financial Stability Report we indicated that evidence pointed to some overvaluation of stock prices in Chile, but we also indicated that financial stability was not threatened by potential corrections, even sharp corrections, in these prices. Of course, making this assessment is not a trivial task – as modeling asset prices is complex – and it is not the role of central banks to communicate continuous assessments of asset prices. For this reason, this kind of communication must be done exceptionally, and in the context of discussing the potential implications of these price developments on current and future  BIS central bankers’ speeches  3  financial stability. In addition, communication must be done in a timely manner, before vulnerabilities build up.
What we learned as a result of this experience was, among other things, that years of historic data on fixed-income market yields and spreads could not have anticipated the size of the movements in credit spreads that in fact occurred in August and September. We also learned that markets that did not previously move together can suddenly do so, that trends that were under way for several years can abruptly come to an end, and that spreads that have been consistently narrow for years can suddenly widen. In the wake of these events, we have become all too aware that liquidity can be illusory – that individual traders may be able to exit a position when they wish but that not all traders can exit their positions at the same time. For many, these lessons have been humbling. Going forward, it is important to bear in mind that there most certainly will be further instances when the credit intermediation process is disrupted, when we will face other threats to the wellbeing of our market positions, our institutions and the global economy. These risks are in the nature of the intermediation process itself. As the global capital markets continue to grow and become ever more sophisticated – as I believe they will – what is most important for us as central bankers is to operate with a disciplined sense of priorities. It is clear that we as central banks cannot be responsible for any single bond holder, any single bank or any single financial institution.

At the end of the day, the flow of credit from securities markets has the same impact on our respective societies as that from banks. Therefore, central bankers have an obligation to understand the nature of these flows and the risks that they raise. Crucial to our obligations to our citizens is the need to be certain that these credit markets work smoothly and that credit flows efficiently from those most willing and able to bear the risks to those most able to put the funds to good use. This is as true for the United States as it is for any other country, developed or developing. Does this mean that central banks believe that capital markets should be supervised in the same ways banks are overseen? Clearly the answer to this question is no. This is not our role. In my view, central banks broadly have two main responsibilities with respect to the global debt markets. The first is to enhance the price discovery process by promoting transparency in their own actions. The second is to ensure that the banks, as providers of liquidity, perform their proper role in supporting the trading process by making sound credit decisions. In the United States, the Federal Open Market Committee or FOMC has a pronounced effect on the fixed-income market, both through its policy decisions and in the way the Federal Reserve conducts monetary policy. Indeed, an important part of the price discovery process is the anticipation of the Federal Reserve’s future actions.
However, I am less sanguine when it comes to the credibility component, which boils down to trust. Trust has to be earned over a long period of time, and can be lost overnight. 2/4  BIS central bankers' speeches  For Hong Kong to excel, it is not enough for our financial institutions and practitioners to be technically competent only. They must also uphold high ethical standards in order to gain the trust and respect of customers. 10. In the past few years, a number of misdeeds by some financial institutions and practitioners have come to light. For example, the rigging of LIBOR had led to international reform of interest rate benchmarks, a process which is still ongoing. There were also cases of front running and other irregularities in FX and gold trading that had led to investigation into some banks and senior bankers. All these point to the weakness of the tradition of “self-discipline” amongst financial practitioners. It is now considered that more comprehensive and possibly more prescriptive guidelines on ethical standards and conduct are needed to strengthen the system. The latest FX Global Code is the outcome of one of such reforms. The Code was developed over the past two years by 16 central banks, including the HKMA, together with private-sector institutions from both the buy and sell sides. It is a comprehensive set of global principles on good practice in the FX market, and it is intended to promote a robust, fair, liquid, open, and transparent market.

2  BIS Review 115/2009  The financial crisis and the global economic recession have had a substantial impact on the Norwegian economy, and a range of measures have been implemented to mitigate the effects of the crisis. These measures prevented the liquidity crisis from developing into a solvency crisis in the banking sector and a crisis in the real economy in Norway. Norges Bank has supplied additional liquidity to banks and eased collateral requirements. The Bank has provided loans with longer maturities, used foreign exchange swaps for both USD and EUR to supply krone liquidity and provided loans to Norwegian banks in USD, which Norges Bank can now procure from the Federal Reserve. The key policy rate has been reduced by 4.50 percentage points since 15 October last year to 1.25 per cent. To facilitate banks’ funding, the government has given banks access to liquid government paper in exchange for mortgage-backed securities issued by the banks’ mortgage companies. The Government has also provided increased loans and guarantees to Norwegian export industries, and has raised lending limits for state banks. Folketrygdfondet (the Government Pension Fund – Norway) has also been permitted to increase its purchases of bonds. The authorities have arranged to supply risk capital to Norwegian banks through the Norwegian State Finance Fund to strengthen banks’ solidity. In order to curb the fall in activity in the Norwegian economy, government expenditure will increase by more than 10 per cent in 2009.
The integration of e-trading with internet banking and banks’ websites is also a notable feature. These IT advancements have enabled banks to gradually replace manual work by automated procedures with on-line real time processing. BIS Review 13/2008  1  2. Adoption of IT by banks in Sri Lanka  2.1 The banking sector in Sri Lanka has undergone a rapid transformation with the adoption of IT-based banking solutions. The widespread usage of IT in Sri Lanka’s banking sector began only in the late 1980s with the introduction of the first ATM by HSBC Bank in 1986. The introduction of ATMs and automated processes has reduced the cost per transaction significantly, as staff overhead costs have decreased. 2.2 Initially, the banks adopted systems developed in-house or used vendor provided systems on a decentralized basis, thus transforming manual systems to automated processes. However, most of the core-banking systems provided by different vendors were ad hoc solutions and on piecemeal basis, i.e. separate modules and technology platforms for key operations such as deposit mobilization and lending, trade finance, treasury operations, and more recently card transactions. Those who opted to implement new core-banking systems together with other sub systems and integrations may have made relatively large investments with sustainable gains to compensate costs. The arrival of new foreign and private banks with state-of-the-art technology-based services pushed other banks in Sri Lanka to move towards the latest technologies so as to retain their customer base and meet competition.

Today, we will also focus on what this evolution means for low- and moderate-income households. One session will explore on-the-ground community development and labor models, with a focus on the implications for low- and moderate-income earners. This will be an important discussion on how to help workers build the skills necessary to adapt to change—a conversation that should ultimately include workers, their employers, their communities and the public sector, working together. We all need to share in the responsibility of helping people increase and maintain the skills relevant to contributing valued work. Again, I wish you a fruitful dialogue, and I commend you for coming together to discuss such important issues and the trends affecting the U.S. workforce. 1  BIS central bankers' speeches
Since 1973, international trade has been growing on average by 11% per annum (from 22% of the GDP in 1973 to over 40% of the GDP in 2002), whereas the capital flows 1 increased from 7% of the global GDP in 1973 up to over 20% of the GDP in 2002. 1  Capital flows are defined here as a total of the FDI, portfolio investments and other investments recognized in the financial account of the balance of payments statement, exclusive of changes in receivables and liabilities of monetary authorities and the central government.

It seems that apart from the – growing for a few years now – role of the global financial markets and the liberalization of commerce, new factors have emerged, such as taking advantage of the technological progress in the ICT and joining the global economy by China and India. Thomas Friedman, author of the famous book entitled “The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century”, 24 hows how radical the changes in the organization of the manufacturing process and service performance have been over the recent years, as a result of, inter alia, the use of new communication technologies, such as the Internet, mobile phones, or the appearance of such techniques of gaining and processing information as the Google search engine. I may share my personal thought with you. I have just completed my work on the first draft of a paper discussing global imbalances. Owing to the Internet and new websites providing specialist information and knowledge in the area of economy, it took me three months to write the article. I worked on it only in my free time, of which I do not have much as the deputy president of the central bank. Ten years ago, over a three–month period, I would probably not have been able to collect even half of the literature, not to mention the ongoing monitoring of speeches delivered at all important conferences dedicated to global imbalances.