samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
One example is our work with the Hong Kong Association of Banks in carrying out a comprehensive review of credit card practices in Hong Kong, drawing on reforms undertaken in the UK and US. As a result, we have been rolling out in stages 31 measures aimed at promoting fair and responsible business practices by credit card issuers, and all these will become effective by 2013. A second example is our partnership with the Financial Services and the Treasury Bureau and the Securities and Futures Commission to establish the Financial Dispute Resolution Centre. The objective is to help consumers settle monetary disputes quickly by means of mediation and arbitration. The Centre came into operation in June this year. 2  BIS central bankers’ speeches  The HKMA & consumer education On consumer education the HKMA has also been very active. From time to time, we publish articles, called “insight articles”, to increase consumers’ awareness of their rights and obligations in relation to particular consumer products like accumulators, Octopus cards and instalment payment plans. We also highlight key features and risks of certain investment products, and remind consumers not to invest if they do not understand a product. We have launched earlier this week a “Consumer Corner” on the HKMA website to provide important information on local banking consumer issues, including a set of “frequently asked questions” based on public enquiries and topical issues. As with protection, so with education, we are also working with our partners.

This is a great strength for the industry and highly beneficial to both banks and consumers. However, we should also acknowledge that it can expose some customers to higher risks arising from investment in complex financial products. I have in mind especially consumers who may be less sophisticated but who may nonetheless have a high level of trust in banks. In that sense, it was not surprising that following the financial crisis, there was greater demand by consumers and consumer groups to better understand the risks of investment products offered by banks. This demand has been amplified by a number of other trends, namely: the greater complexity of financial products; the rapid pace of change in financial standards and regulations; the rising number of high net worth individuals in Asia-Pacific actively looking for investment opportunities; and the recognition that regulation alone is insufficient to protect consumers. Financial education has thus become an important complement to market conduct and prudential regulation. Raising the financial competencies of individuals has become a long-term policy priority for the financial industry. This is particularly crucial in Hong Kong where, as you know, we have a regulatory framework based on disclosure and complementary customer suitability assessments. In that context, it is especially important that consumers understand a product’s features and risks thoroughly when considering their investments. They have to decide whether or not an investment suits their objectives, and whether they have the ability to assume the associated risks.
Page 9  Chart 6: Indicators of pay growth are elevated  Sources: HMRC, ONS and Bank calculations  A tight labour market is accompanied by resilience in business confidence. In line with evidence from the Bank’s Decision Maker Panel survey, this may reflect business-to-business pricing power within supply chains still suffering from supply disruptions. After all, within a single supply chain, one firm’s sourcing problem is another firm’s resilient demand. Supporting this view, the Banks’ Agents report that a further strengthening of margins is likely, especially in firms that are not directly facing consumer demand. Page 10  Chart 7: PMIs suggest business confidence is resilient(a)  Sources: S&P Global/CIPS. (a) A reading of above 50 indicates positive change on the previous month while a reading below 50 indicates negative change. Data for April 2022 are flash estimates. Chart 8: Banks’ Agents report further strengthening in margins is likely  (a) Question: ‘To what extent have you already passed through higher costs to prices?’  The influence of monetary policy On the back of this assessment, the current momentum in UK headline inflation developments is  Page 11  substantial. But, given lags in the transmission of monetary policy to price developments, high inflation today does not, of itself, justify tighter policy today. Rather monetary policy has to be forward looking, calibrating the policy stance to be appropriate at a horizon of 18 months to two years, once the transmission lags unwind. And that is where the MPC’s May forecast gets more complicated.

If we were to see commodity prices rise further, would this lead to stronger second round effects in domestic wage and price setting behaviour? Or would the real income squeeze implied by higher energy prices lead some of those that left the labour force during the pandemic to seek jobs, easing cost pressures stemming from the tightness in the labour market? The scenarios published by the MPC thus far reveal the impact of changing one of the conditioning assumptions for its baseline forecast, while holding the other assumptions unchanged. Such exercises can provide insight into the marginal impact of changes in the assumptions on the inflation outlook. But they don’t reveal the overall impact that incorporates the joint interaction among the conditioning assumptions. In interpreting the implications of the MPC’s published forecast and scenarios for the monetary policy outlook, this limitation of the published scenarios needs to be kept in mind. The conjuncture To sum up, the MPC’s current forecast embodies a tension between two elements. On the one hand, headline inflation is clearly too high, the UK labour market is tight, wages are growing at stronger rates than would normally be deemed consistent with the inflation target, and business confidence is resilient, in part in anticipation of being able to re-establish profit margins. In short, inflationary momentum in the UK is currently strong.
These may lead to different price developments across countries within the Monetary Union in the short run via indirect tax changes, liberalisation measures and administrative price changes. These are generally not of the same magnitude and timing across countries. Differences in growth and inflation may also occur over relatively short periods due to the occurrence of “asymmetric shocks” or differences in the responses to common shocks. A very clear example of such an asymmetric shock was German reunification. Other shocks affect countries in a more or less similar fashion - for example, recent increases in oil prices have tended to lead to higher consumer prices in all euro area countries in the past few months. Shocks may affect countries in a diverse way due to different structures of the economy, patterns of trade and/or production for example. Evidence tends to suggest, however, that the industrial specialisation of the euro area countries is not one-sided, so that there is no risk of significant asymmetric effects. Moreover, the high degree of trade between euro area countries means that country- or region-specific developments tend to have significant spillover effects within the euro area. Nevertheless, a common shock may have different consequences, depending on the precise institutional frameworks within the different countries. The possible so-called “second-round effects” of oil prices on wage and price developments may be considered to fall into this category. Short-term or cyclical differences in demand pressures - though difficult to measure with precision - are an important cause of short-term variations in price increases.

A short list of the lessons should reflect all these aspects: what we have learned or think we have learned about the causes of the crisis; about the efficiency of the institutional texture and the array of instruments at hand; and, last but not least, about the most appropriate positioning in the event of a crisis. With these criteria in mind, I will refer to nine lessons, of which seven are universally valid and two hold particularly true for emerging economies, such as Romania. In order to root out any possible confusion, I would like to point out from the very beginning what these lessons do NOT deal with. First, they do not address the issue of shorter or longer economic cycles and do not suggest that a crisis means the end of an economic cycle. Second, the lessons do not provide an answer to the question whether we could ever avoid a financial crisis. 1. Low inflation is not a sufficient condition for ensuring financial stability in the long run. Past experience appeared to have confirmed the opinion that inflation is the major source of financial instability. High inflation episodes were usually accompanied by pronounced financial instability and banking sector crises or were followed by recession after the authorities took inadequate measures to curb inflation. The current global financial crisis became manifest after nearly two decades of relatively low, stable inflation. A number of factors caused low inflation to coexist with ample liquidity.
With this, the MPR is between 150 and 200 bp below its levels considered neutral. The speed with which we have made this reduction responds to our conviction that the medium-term inflation outlook was revealing a scenario that jeopardized the fulfillment of the policy goal. All this, because of the implications that the evolution of the macro scenario, in particular weak activity, had on them. Considering the cuts already made, we believe that monetary policy is now highly expansionary and consistent with inflation at 3% over the projection horizon. Within this horizon we will see in the coming months that annual inflation will fall again, approaching 2%. We will also see months of poor activity, as shown by the latest Imacec. But the improvement in external conditions, the disappearance of specific factors that have affected activity and prices, and the monetary impulse itself, will allow the economy to regain more growth in the second half of this year and in 2018, with capacity gaps that will begin to close in the course of 2018 at the same time that inflation will converge to the policy target. This, by the way, does not mean that the MPR will not be adjusted again, but that in the most likely scenario no new changes are needed, and that the most important thing will be to let the monetary impulse permeate the economy for as long as necessary in order that, combined with the other mentioned factors, it will generate a visible convergence to the policy target.

These  BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  estimations conditioned the retaining of the stimulating nature of monetary policy during the second quarter of 2012. The key rate stood at the lowest historical level, providing eased monetary conditions in order to meet our inflation target and support the Albania’s economic activity. Also, the Bank of Albania has continued to inject sufficient liquidity demanded by the banking system, against an expanded collateral base and at adequate maturity terms. According to recent data from INSTAT, the Albanian economy recorded an annual fall of 0.2% in the first quarter of 2012. Industry contracted 19.3% y-o-y, mainly due to the significant decrease in electrical energy output. Also, Construction decreased its activity in real terms, by 17.6%, thus providing a negative contribution to the performance of the gross domestic product. By contrast, Services contributed positively to the economic activity, pointing to an annual growth of 6.0%. Agricultural sector grew 4.5%, y-o-y during this period, providing a positive contribution to the growth of the gross domestic product. Estimations on the aggregate demand in the first quarter of 2012 suggest a continuing weak domestic demand. The consolidated fiscal policy determined the lack of fiscal stimulus in this period and a downturn in public sector’s demand for goods and services. Private consumption remains slow, thus reflecting the prudent consumer’s behaviour and the increasing tendency for saving. Private investments also remained low.
Peter Pang: A decade of Hong Kong Dollar settlement in the CLS system Opening remarks by Mr Peter Pang, Deputy Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, at the 10th anniversary celebration of Hong Kong Dollar settlement in CLS, Hong Kong, 21 October 2014. *  *  *  David 1, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, I am honoured to be here today to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Hong Kong dollar settlement in the CLS system. Opening 2. If we were a married couple, this event would mark our Tin Anniversary, with tin symbolizing durability and pliability. It is good to note that our bonding remains robust, despite the fact that CLS has 16 other currency partners, and its desire to have more in the future. 3. According to Jane Austen, “happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance”. Being a monetary authority, the HKMA would not leave such an important financial infrastructure for addressing the FX settlement risk to chance. 4. The one thing that keeps our bonding with CLS strong is our common vision – to provide the solution to help market players eliminate the FX settlement risks through a highly effective and efficient settlement platform. 5. Our decision to join the CLS in 2004 was based on the simple fact that CLS provides the most powerful global solution to eliminate the FX settlement risks among market players. And CLS has delivered such a solution without a hitch in the past decade. Good times 6.

A reference to the letter appeared in Skidelsky, R. John Maynard Keynes Volume 1: Hopes Betrayed, 1883-1920, Macmillan, London, 1983, page 280. The official attendance on 13 September was 38,575; the Villa scorer was the incomparable Clem Stephenson, who may have lacked pace but whose passes were, according to contemporary observers, “as sweet as stolen kisses”; and the ‘most expensive’ right winger for Blackburn Rovers was John “Jocky” Simpson who cost Blackburn a record fee of £ when he was transferred from Falkirk in 1911. BIS Review 5/2004  1  do those prices come from? Each month - on “Index Day” (either the second or third Tuesday of the month) - around 300 “price collectors” visit a wide range of retail outlets and record the prices charged for 130,000 different items, ranging from small loaves of brown bread to large lawnmowers. Each of these different items will have changed in price by a different amount. A key difference between the CPI and RPIX is how these 130,000 price changes are averaged to give a measure of overall inflation. RPIX inflation is, for most goods, an arithmetic average of the inflation rates for each item. In contrast, CPI inflation is measured as the increase in the geometric average (the average of the logarithms) of the different prices.
The fact that, last summer, most banks came out with information on their positions in the sub-prime market only hesitantly, providing an incomplete picture, has made a significant contribution to the uncertainty in the interbank market. Consequently, we are reiterating our request that banks do a better job in making information available on their existing risks. In order to promote market discipline, it must be possible for outsiders to be able to assess a bank's resilience under both normal and stress conditions. Second, recent events highlight the limitations of risk-weighted capital adequacy requirements. The problems in risk management have made it clear that the modelling of bank risks will always remain imperfect. In interpreting capital adequacy requirements which are based on such risk models, we must therefore proceed with appropriate caution. This is particularly relevant in view of the new capital adequacy requirements that will also be introduced in Switzerland next year. The main change under these requirements, known as Basel II, is that capital adequacy requirements will rely more heavily on banks' own risk assessments. Bearing this in mind, the lesson learned last summer may well have come at the right time. This now begs the question as to whether – in addition to the complex, riskweighted capital adequacy requirements – other criteria, such as volume limits or the simple debt-equity ratio should not also be considered. The reason for this is that the higher this ratio, the greater the leverage effect of losses on the soundness of a bank.

CPI inflation still reflects the effects of the previous repo-rate increases on housing costs. Various measures of underlying inflation show that inflationary pressures are moderate (see Figure 21). As economic activity recovers, underlying inflation will gradually rise towards 2 per cent in the years ahead. Continued low repo rate will facilitate stable development Our forecast for the repo rate is that it will remain unchanged until sometime next year and that monetary policy will continue to be expansionary — the repo rate is low in an historical perspective (see Figure 22). This will contribute to a gradual normalisation of inflation. Apart from stabilising inflation, monetary policy also aims to stabilise the real economy. Stabilising the real economy means, in more concrete terms, stabilising resource utilisation, that is the deviation of production and employment from long-term levels. Resource utilisation can be measured in many ways, but our overall assessment is that it is somewhat below normal at present. An ongoing expansionary monetary policy may also help to normalise resource utilisation during the forecast period. As resource utilisation and inflationary pressures increase, the need for an expansionary monetary policy will decline. There will be a need to gradually raise the repo rate to bring inflation close to the target and to stabilise resource utilisation. As the situation is highly uncertain, however, things may develop in a different direction than we expect. We see two main risks at present.
As a result, by the first quarter of 2022, inflation in the EU was already at its highest level since the creation of the monetary union. Lastly, in this unstable scenario in which supply and demand had yet to adjust, the outbreak of war in Ukraine fuelled further instability in the inflation outlook and hindered the economic recovery that was starting to take hold in early 2022. Europe is particularly exposed to the economic repercussions of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. First, the continent has close commercial ties with Ukraine, a supplier of primary goods such as grain, sunflower oil or corn. These products are widely used in the European agriculture, farming and food industries. Second, and most importantly, Russia continues to play a major role as an exporter of energy products to Europe (mainly oil and gas), and remains of key importance for some European countries. Russia is the euro area’s main supplier of natural gas and oil: in 2019, 36% of all of the natural gas consumed in the euro area came from Russia, as did 22% of all of the oil consumed. As a result of the war, the European Union has taken measures to sanction certain activities that could be used to finance Russia and, by extension, the invasion. In turn, Russia has restricted supplies of gas to Europe, and these are hard to replace in the short term. All these elements make up a cocktail that is hard to digest.

Potential drawbacks of the new framework on a small open economy  But would the introduction of the euro be only good news for the Swiss economy? We know that a revolution is always associated with risks and uncertainties, thus it should not surprise you that we were very much concerned about possible negative developments. In the mid-1990s, as the European monetary construction was under way, we tried to imagine the potential negative effects of the euro introduction on the Swiss economy. Our goal was to be prepared to face difficult situations. We had identified three main challenges: a)  First, the major risk was that the new European currency would destabilize the Swiss franc. In the past, the Swiss franc, along with the German mark, played the role of a safe haven currency whenever monetary crises occurred. With the disappearance of the German currency, the Swiss franc would find itself first in line of fire in case of a dollar crisis, for example, or even worse, in case of doubts about the stability of the European currency. b)  Second, we risked seeing the euro being increasingly used as a means of payment in Switzerland. As the common currency was about to become the main unit of account for our exports, we feared that domestic firms might adopt the euro as well, so as to minimize exchange rate risks. Some were even considering wages being paid in euro.
Central bankers rightly become nervous - or at least slightly uncomfortable - if public expectations become too high or are elevated to quasi-religious dimensions. Moreover, if a central bank - for whatever reasons acquires prestige and standing that transcends the strict confines of its mandate and becomes an object of faith or mythical devotion, this may suggest that it fills a void left elsewhere. In particular this may be an indication of a lack of confidence in other - more important - institutions in society. To my mind independent central banks fulfil an important function for the benefit of society. Their job is to maintain price stability, maintain trust and confidence in the currency. Nothing more and nothing less should be asked of them. This reflects a clean division of labour and a clear allocation of responsibilities vis-à-vis other economic policy actors and, especially, vis-à-vis democratically elected governments. Stable money is too important to be overburdened with other purposes. This is especially important in the process of European integration. 7  BIS Review 96/2000  5. Faith in the European Central Bank, faith in Europe? The move to European Monetary Union is an important step in the long history of closer European integration. In particular, in the field of monetary policy the Maastricht Treaty represents a decisive act of delegation of decision-making authority or sovereignty. The Treaty entrusts the objective of price stability to an independent and supranational body, the European Central Bank.

In addition, the conducive tax regime which accords neutrality in treatment between Islamic and conventional financial products sets the stage for greater innovation to take place to support the progressive development of the Islamic financial services industry going forward. With this strengthened Islamic financial infrastructure now being firmly achieved in the first phase of the Financial Sector Masterplan, the Islamic financial services industry is poised to tap new growth opportunities and maximize the full potential of Islamic banking and finance. The entry of Commerce Tijari Bank Berhad into the Islamic financial services industry at this juncture is indeed timely. The challenge that lies ahead calls for strategic positioning to maximise the potential that a universal Islamic banking licence accords in tapping new growth areas. While Islamic retail, corporate and investment banking product offerings have grown in sophistication, financial activities such as private equity investments, real estate investments, private wealth and fund management are now rapidly gaining prominence. There is therefore a need to allocate adequate resources to build distinct capabilities in these newly emerging areas. The move into these strategic niche markets would also increase the diversity of new asset classes for Islamic investment. This would not only contribute to further enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of the financial intermediation process in the Islamic  BIS Review 26/2004  1  financial system but also enhance Malaysia’s potential as an attractive international hub for Islamic finance.