samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
During this period one could say that the central banks’ original task of guaranteeing the value of the means of payment was neglected as other tasks, primarily affecting demand in the economy, were perceived as more important and more interesting for monetary policy. The consequence was that the nominal anchor was relinquished and to establish it again proved to require considerable effort. Let me before I discuss the other important component of an efficient payment system – financial stability – say something about the most common approaches to attaining price stability. There are currently two predominant means of trying to ensure that inflation remains at a low and stable level. One is to tie one’s own currency to the currency of a country with a long tradition of low and stable inflation. The fixed exchange rate thus becomes an intermediate target through which one hopes to attain the ultimate target – price stability. The other means is to allow the exchange rate to float and to give the central bank the task of acting more directly to attain low, stable inflation – what is known as inflation targeting. The changeover in monetary policy made by Sweden at the beginning of the 1990s meant that we switched from the first method, fixing the exchange rate, to the second, targeting inflation. The reason was quite simply that the fixed exchange rate had not functioned very well as a means of keeping down inflation and establishing a nominal anchor in the economy.

Ajith Nivard Cabraal: Foreign exchange reserve management Inaugural address by Mr Ajith Nivard Cabraal, Governor of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka, at the SAARCFINANCE seminar on Foreign Exchange Reserve Management, organised by the Centre for Banking Studies of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka, Colombo, 15 August 2008. *  *  *  Deputy Governors, Director of the CBS, My dear friends, 1. I am pleased to participate at the opening ceremony of this SAARCFINANCE seminar on foreign exchange reserve management. I also welcome all participants to this course and extend to the participants from the central banks of our neighboring countries, our resource persons from BIS, Deutsche Bank group, Citigroup and Reserve Bank of India, a very warm welcome to our country as well. 2. At the 17th SAARCFINANCE Governors’ meeting held in Washington in April 2008, it was decided to organize a seminar in foreign exchange reserve management. It was also decided that the Centre for Banking Studies (CBS) in Sri Lanka, with its over 26 years of experience in training and developing financial sector professionals, together with the International Operations Department of the CBSL, should host this seminar, so as to provide a forum within the region to discuss the latest challenges facing the managers of sovereign reserves at present. 3. My dear friends, foreign exchange reserve management has gained increased importance in Central bank activities in the recent past, due to two factors.
That is to say, gradually reducing the sizeable volume of public debt that will arise because of this crisis is feasible, provided we have an appropriate consolidation programme. This programme should include a clear definition of the budgetary objectives and their timeframe, along with details of the measures needed to attain them. It should also be based on a prudent forecast of macroeconomic developments and include a suitable response to possible slippage. It is in the political sphere that the details of this programme must be decided, incorporating social preferences about the level and composition of public spending and revenue. In any event, it should be compatible with an improvement in the quality of public finances. 10  In this connection, it would be a priority to subject the various items on the expenditure side to an exhaustive review, in order to identify those areas with room for more efficiency. It is important that the recommendations stemming from the AIReF’s assessments be taken into account forthwith. A comprehensive review of the tax system is also in order, to improve its revenue-raising capacity and its efficiency. Comparison with the other European countries can offer guidelines here. And, once again, the findings of AIReF’s ongoing review of tax benefits will provide a significant contribution. Finally, in a country as decentralised as Spain, it is vital to be able to count on the collaboration of the regional and local governments in the design and implementation of the consolidation programme.

This advises studying the possibility, depending on how economic activity evolves, of extending the public guarantee mechanisms. In re-designing the latter, priority of access to such resources should be for firms with sound viability prospects. The crisis will significantly impact banks’ credit portfolios. The declines in GDP projected for 2020 under the scenarios previously outlined exceed those of any stress test in the past; yet it is true that, if the rebound in activity forecast for 2021 and 2022 were to materialise, this severity would be significantly mitigated. Moreover, the crisis will affect banks differently in terms of their business model and of the distribution of their exposures to the sectors and regions most affected by the pandemic. Overall, then, we must remain vigilant to stave off the risks to financial stability derived from this crisis, and be ready to respond forcefully at the European level if these risks materialise. Second, in the domestic arena, some of the measures already applied should be temporarily extended and recalibrated. It seems right to retain some of the income support instruments for the most vulnerable households, though it is essential they remain focused and designed so as not to distort, for example, labour market participation decisions. It would also be wise to extend furlough-like schemes in certain sectors and firms that will continue to be very affected by social distancing measures.
Loss of confidence in a bank sets in when depositors fear that this may not happen. An asset management contract is quite different because the promise is at its simplest to return the proceeds of the investment strategy, which may be more or less than the amount invested. It is cruel to remember the Woody Allen jibe at this point that a stockbroker is someone who invests your money until it is all gone. Economists might call the deposit and asset management contract “corner solutions” in that they have a robust definition and lie at opposite ends of a range. If so, With Profits falls in between, and it is in this ground that issues can arise. The proposition was essentially to offer investors a blended exposure to cash, bond, property and equity return with some degree of smoothing of overall returns, essentially at management’s discretion, to reduce market timing risk. The marketing tended to make much of these products’ potential to earn above cash returns without the volatility of pure equity exposure; and this in turn conditioned policy holders’ expectations, a fact first acknowledged explicitly in the UK’s prudential solvency regime for insurers in 1967 (bear in mind that this was not the original prudential regime, which was introduced in 1870).

Perhaps a more neutral, if less catchy, description of these trends is needed. In terms of their economic impact, these trends have had the effect of making work more “divisible” than in the past. The fall in unionisation has made workers more divisible at the level of the profession, sector or firm. Wage bargaining 1  See, for example, Abel et al (2016). IMF (2017). See www.gov.uk/government/groups/employment-practices-in-the-modern-economy 4 Solow (2015). 5 For example, Hook (2015). 6 Hudson-Sharp and Runge (2017). 7 Chapman (2017). Also see OECD (2017) for some discussion of ‘job quality’. 2 3  4  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches  4  is less likely to be collective, and more likely to be idiosyncratic, these days. Similarly, the rise in self-employment and part-time working has made work more divisible at the level of the individual worker. People are more likely these days to be paid by the task or the hour. In short, these shifts have meant work and workers may have become more diffuse, more granular, more divisible than in the past. This increased “divisibility” of jobs and work potentially raises a number of important issues, economic and social, about the relationship between employee and employer, many of which are being tackled by the Taylor Review. I want to explore just one dimension - the extent to which they may have influenced wage-setting in the economy.
Mr. Gunnarsson reports on some aspects of economic conditions and current prospects in Iceland Address by the Governor of the Central Bank of Iceland, Mr. Birgir Isl. Gunnarsson, at the Bank’s Annual Meeting on 31/3/98. On behalf of the Board of Governors of the Central Bank I welcome you to this 37th Annual Meeting of the Bank. The Bank’s Annual Accounts for 1997 have today been ratified by the Minister of Commerce, and the Bank’s Annual Report has been published. The Report gives an overview of the Bank’s operations and a detailed description of economic and monetary developments in the past year, as well as of the Bank’s monetary policy objectives and measures. I will discuss some aspects of economic conditions and current prospects, mainly those that are most closely linked to the Central Bank’s areas of responsibility. Economic Growth GDP grew sharply in 1997 for the second year in a row. It is estimated that growth was 5 percent, compared with 5.5 percent in 1996. Economic growth in Iceland during these two years has been far higher than in other industrial countries. In the European Union growth was 2.6 percent and in the United States 3.8 percent; in Japan, which has faced adversity in recent times, growth was only 1 percent. The British economy has strengthened in recent years and growth is estimated to have been 3 percent in 1997.

Yields on both indexed and non-indexed bonds have continued to fall this year, with the yield on government guaranteed indexed bonds now well below 5 percent which some had regarded as the floor. Although money and bond market yields declined in 1997 the lending rates of commercial and saving banks changed little. These rates have now begun to come down. Profitability of deposit institutions The profitability of banks improved during 1997. Current information on profits of the commercial banks shows a substantial increase compared with the preceding year. Their combined return on equity was 9.2% in 1997, compared with 8.2% in 1996 and 5% in the year before that. Nonetheless, profitability varied widely among them, and the different conditions that they faced complicate comparisons. Landsbanki (the National Bank) and Búnaðarbanki (the Agricultural Bank), for example, incurred large irregular expenses related to the final settlement of their pension obligations, which cannot be expected to recur in future. Provisions to reserves for loan losses have fallen sharply among all the banks. At the same time, the six largest savings banks recorded some decline in profitability compared with the previous year, and their return BIS Review 42/1998  -7-  on equity was 8.5%. I should underline, however, that profitability varied widely among individual savings banks.
Ravi Menon: Singapore FinTech - innovation, inclusion, inspiration Presentation by Mr Ravi Menon, Managing Director of the Monetary Authority of Singapore, at Singapore FinTech Festival 2018, Singapore, 12 November 2018. * * * Ladies and gentlemen, good morning. What a man and what a story. Saqib’s story shows how technology can help find innovative solutions to real problems. It shows how innovation guided by empathy can help create a more inclusive society. And of course it is a story that is inspiration to all of us – to do better, to be better, to help others. That is why we asked Saqib to kick off the third edition of the Singapore FinTech Festival this morning. Because Saqib’s story exemplifies what Singapore’s own FinTech journey is all about – innovation, inclusion, inspiration. Innovation – because we want to find better ways of doing things. Inclusion – because we want to benefit as many people as possible. Inspiration – because amidst all challenges around us, there is hope in a better world. Please join me once again in thanking Saqib for being here with us today. Financial Services Built Around Us Welcome to the third edition of the Singapore FinTech Festival (SFF). This year, we have close to 40,000 participants from more than 100 countries. SFF has become the biggest annual gathering of the global FinTech community. You guys made it happen. Thank you all for your overwhelming and unstinting support.

Pongpen Ruengvirayudh: The current economic situation and recent monetary policy developments Opening remarks by Ms Pongpen Ruengvirayudh, Deputy Governor for Monetary Stability of the Bank of Thailand, at the Joint Foreign Chamber of Commerce in Thailand (JFCCT), Bangkok, 21 May 2014. *  *  *  Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen, 1. It is my pleasure to be back here at the Joint Foreign Chambers of Commerce (JFCCT). First of all, I would like to thank JFCCT for inviting me and would also like to thank all the members of JFCCT for your continuing contribution to the economic development here in Thailand. Economic outlook 2. A great deal has changed both domestically and externally since I was here last year. With respect to domestic economy, the prolonged political stalemate has weighed considerably on confidence, exacerbating the already fragile economy. Externally, the announcement of the US Fed to scale down its Quantitative Easing program since May 2013 has led to turmoil in financial markets across emerging economies. Today, I therefore would like to take this opportunity to share briefly with you my thoughts on the country’s economic outlook, the medium-term challenges we face and monetary policy of the Bank of Thailand. 3. When it comes to current economic assessment, the slowdown of the Thai economy over the last year, in combination with uncertainty over the ongoing political conflict, is a growing concern for many. The NESDB two days ago announced that GDP growth in 1Q14 contracted by 0.6% (YOY), compared to same period last year.
Regulatory cooperation in Asia These initiatives are being supplemented in Asia by regional cooperation on both a bilateral and multilateral basis. There have been a number of factors driving this. The aftermath of the Mexican crisis in January 1995, which saw speculative attacks on a number of Asian currencies, encouraged the view that there was a need for countries in the region to strengthen their defences in this area. We have thus seen the arrangement of an interlocking series of bilateral repo agreements using US Treasuries between Asian central banks, including the Hong Kong Monetary Authority. These agreements are intended to provide additional liquidity for exchange rate stability purposes. More generally, there has also perhaps been a feeling among the Asian countries that the existing arrangements for central bank cooperation were somewhat “euro-centric” and did not take adequate account of the growing importance of the Asian region where over 40% of the world’s foreign currency reserves are now held. This feeling has to some extent been addressed by the more participative approach now being adopted by the Basle Committee and the BIS. But there is nonetheless a view that greater regional cooperation among Asian central banks is both necessary and desirable. This has been summed up in the concept of an “Asian BIS”, though this is somewhat misleading as there are no immediate plans to move towards the BIS Review 55/1997  -4-  institutional structure which the name would imply.

Other policy makers have faced similar challenges, and have found highly innovative and effective ways to overcome them, such as the Treasury’s furlough scheme. And of course the intellectual challenges faced by economic policy makers have been tiny compared with the very substantial challenges faced by the healthcare and other key workers who have had to tackle the Covid pandemic itself, as well as those who have suffered from the disease. My previous Strand Group lecture, “The First 50 years of the Government Economic Service”, touched on some of that earlier experience. 2 My MPC colleague Silvana Tenreyro made a similar observation in her 2018 speech on models in macroeconomics. 3 Or to give the quote from Korzybski (1933) more fully: “A map is not the territory it represents, but, if correct, it has a similar structure to the territory, which accounts for its usefulness”. 4 It’s not for nothing that the Bank of England’s central forecasting model is known as COMPASS. 1  2  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/speeches and @BoE_PressOffice  2  Figure 1: The MPC’s approach to its forecasts has evolved during the pandemic  3  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/speeches and @BoE_PressOffice  3  An evolving approach to the outlook  The MPC, supported by the efforts of Bank of England staff, has continued to make use of forecasts throughout the Covid period.
It is also interesting to note that credit derivatives and hedge funds, which many people claimed would cause the next crisis, have not reinforced the problems in the market, but rather to them being handled. Nevertheless, the market turbulence has shown that the deficiencies in the design and functioning of the credit markets need closer investigation. Some innovations appear to have been a little too fast for the market. At the same time, as I said in my introduction, it is still too early to draw any definite conclusions from what we have seen. When loans pass through several channels and are repackaged along the way, there is often a long distance between the final investor and the party that originally issued the loan. This means that the incentive to make a thorough credit assessment declines. It appears as though the original credit grantor took too little responsibility in the repackaging process. The way that information on credit quality is passed on to investors is also open to debate. One of the credit rating agencies’ tasks is to fill in the information gap between the issuer and the end investor. 3 With hindsight one can note that this has not always been successful. But even if there are deficiencies in the way that the credit rating agencies have worked with regard to structured credit products, there are also signs that many investors misunderstood how a credit rating should be used.

We need to ensure that intermediaries build, over time, stronger capital and liquidity cushions, especially for trading activities. The Basel committee has been very active and currently is devising proposals. But our main priority is to reduce procyclicality in our financial systems. Stronger capital and liquidity cushions must be built in good times and drawn down in bad times. The essential contribution however will come from a change in our provisioning rules. The objective is to build automatic and “through the cycle” stabilizers in a transparent way and according to a rule based system. I believe there is a lot to learn from the Spanish dynamic provisioning approach. Finally, nothing will work if we do not address the issue of incentives. In a market based economy, incentives determine the behaviours of agents. Regulators must aim at creating an environment that is conducive to both efficiency and stability and that can avoid excessive risk taking. This is why compensation practices are so important. They should be structured so as to induce appropriate risk behaviour and encourage "true" financial innovation. Competition between financial institutions in hiring staff creates a coordination problem and leads to many excesses, acknowledged by the institutions themselves. Compensation policies should therefore be guided by clear and internationally agreed rules covering: (i) the involvement of senior management in traders’ compensation policies, (ii) detailed disclosure requirements, (iii) clear and direct links between the payment of bonuses and the longer term profitability of institutions, i.e.
Erdem Başçi: Recent economic and financial developments in Turkey Speech by Mr Erdem Başçi, Governor of the Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey, at the press conference for the presentation of the January 2016 Inflation Report, Ankara, 26 January 2016. *  *  *  Distinguished Guests, Welcome to the briefing held to convey the main messages of the Inflation Report of January 2016. The report typically summarizes the economic outlook underlying monetary policy decisions, shares our evaluations on macroeconomic developments and presents our medium-term inflation forecasts, which were revised in view of the developments in the last quarter, along with our monetary policy stance. In addition to the main text, the report includes seven boxes entailing up-to-date and interesting analyses on various topics. The boxes in this Report look into the sources of the changes in end-2015 inflation forecasts, offer projections about the repercussions of base effects on inflation in 2016, and analyze the dynamics of inflation in Turkey. Moreover, there are boxes that elaborate on Turkey’s changing export market share, study the relationship between consumer confidence indices and financial volatilities, analyze the effects of minimum wage hikes on overall wages, and scrutinize the relationship between loans and growth by sectors. The titles of the boxes are shown on the slide. All of these analyses shed light on noteworthy issues in the Turkish economy. I strongly recommend that you read these boxes, which will soon be published on our website.

Amid an economic environment fraught with prolonged global uncertainties, it is important to contain negative spillovers into the Turkish economy. In terms of the fundamentals of the economy, the significant improvement in the current account balance over the past few years, reasonable growth rates in loans and a loan composition that supports price stability and financial stability all contributed to reducing economic fragilities. These developments were due to the tight monetary policy and the measures taken regarding financial stability as well as the sharp fall in commodity prices in the case of the current account balance. Moreover, the effective use of the measures presented in the August road map has alleviated the excessive fluctuations in exchange rates and loan rates. Our current tight monetary policy reduces the economy’s sensitivity to global shocks, thus supporting financial stability. We maintain the view that the tight monetary policy may be implemented within a narrower interest rate corridor, should the global volatility decline persistently or policy measures that would maintain and improve the gains in external balance and financial stability be implemented effectively. In 2015, the annual growth rate of loans extended to the non-financial sector, which decelerated partly due to our tight monetary policy stance, and the macroprudential measures introduced by the BRSA regarding consumer loans excluding mortgage, fell to 13.6 percent, adjusted for the effect of exchange rates.