samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
Further, the recommendations sought to strengthen the framework for the protection of information by providing greater detail around certain types of information that are not to be shared. Finally, the recommendations encouraged more detailed guidance within the various codes of conduct in the FX market as well as demonstration of greater compliance with such codes. In February of this year, the co-chair of the FXBG, Guy Debelle, spoke at the FX Week Australia Conference about this work and addressed the status of implementation of the recommendations. He noted that while there had been some areas of progress, questions remained about the implementation in other areas – for example, with regard to the recommendations related to more transparent and risk-appropriate pricing of fixing transactions. 11 The FSB has since requested an update this summer on the status of implementation of the FXBG recommendations, and the various foreign exchange committees are working together, and with others, to assist in this effort. Foreign Exchange Committee Additional work to support the implementation of the FXBG recommendations has been an area of focus for the FXC. The FXC is a private sector group, made up of market professionals and sponsored by the New York Fed since 1978, that is intended to help provide guidance and leadership to the global FX market.

Paul Tucker: Remarks on “Making Monetary Policy by Committee” Discussant remarks by Mr Paul Tucker, Executive Director and Member of the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England, on “Making Monetary Policy by Committee” by Alan Blinder, at the Bank of Canada Conference “International experience with the conduct of monetary policy under inflation targeting”, Ottawa, 22-23 July 2008. * * * Central banking involves a lot of learning – by doing, by thinking, researching, and by comparing ourselves with our peers. At the core of that learning process is exchanges amongst central bankers themselves, much of it in Basel. The other rich seam is the academic literature. But relatively few turn (or return) to scholarly reflection after periods of alternatively practising and theorising about central banking. Alan Blinder has therefore provided a signal service, since stepping down as Vice Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, through his series of papers on monetary policy practice and how it both draws on and fuels theory. Today’s paper, on the role of committees in the making of monetary policy 1, places central banks into categories Blinder first set out a few years ago: single decision taker; autocrat-led college; genuinely-collegial; individualistic. It is especially interesting to the Bank of England, where for just over a decade we have operated a one-member/one-vote system for deciding our policy rate. As Blinder rightly says, comparatively speaking, this is clearly at the ‘individualistic’ end of the spectrum, and is a rare example of the species.
This has been driven by a whole host of things, including improved technology and deregulation reducing transaction costs; the unbundling of different types of risk associated with the development of derivatives; and the entry of relatively unconstrained traders, including hedge funds. One result is that in ‘vanilla’ markets it may have become more difficult for intermediaries to make positive risk-adjusted returns that exceed their cost of capital. Anecdotally at least, they make a more attractive return on, amongst other things, exotic products and via transactions tailored to address the risk-management challenges of particular clients or client types. As such, they have a powerful incentive to innovate. Over time, many of the most successful innovations become mainstream, enhancing market efficiency, helping to optimise the distribution of risk, and reducing the initial supernormal returns to the innovators, who move on to the next thing; and so on. As put, that sounds like a benign story for society. And, by and large, I think it is. It does, though, have at least two corollaries. First, investors – whether in funds or firms – should occasionally ask themselves whether they can safely extrapolate into the future the returns that they have earned in the past. Second, investment bank innovators may from time to time face a challenge in keeping the industry’s controls up to speed with what, ex post, turn out to be their most successful innovations. Imagine that, at any particular time, a firm has a portfolio of many innovations. Some will succeed, some won’t.

If, overall, the result were a greater dispersion of risk around the banking system and fewer large exposures relative to capital, the system as a whole would probably be safer even if, net, no credit risk had left the banking industry in aggregate. According to various surveys, some credit risk has been shed to non-banks, including insurance companies, pension funds and hedge funds. That too should, on balance, promote the resilience of the system, not least because non-banks are not part of the core payment systems that underpin our financial markets – provided, of course, that banks prudently manage their counterparty exposures to non-bank sellers of credit protection. As others have argued, this is a change of degree rather than kind: with the growth of corporate bond markets, and especially securitisation, non-banks have been  1  My thanks to Mike Cross, Colin Miles and David Rule for long-running debates on the issues discussed here. For comments, to Peter Andrews, Andrew Bailey, Alex Bowen, Alastair Clark, Paul Fisher, Damien Lynch, Peter Westaway and Simon Wells. And to Sandra Bannister for secretarial support. 2  For an early review, see Rule, D, (2001) ‘The Credit Derivatives Market: its Development and Possible Implications for Financial Stability’, Financial Stability Review, Issue 10, June 2001, pages 117-140 and Rule, D, (2001), ‘Risk transfer between banks, insurance companies and capital markets: an overview’, Financial Stability Review, Issue 11, December 2001, pages 137-159. BIS Review 50/2005  1  running credit portfolios for years.
As a result, real pay growth has ranged from minus 2% to plus 3%. But, due in no small part to the stickiness of nominal pay and its apparent insensitivity either to inflation or a very rapid fall in unemployment, domestically generated inflation pressure has remained low. A similar evolution of unemployment and pay has been seen in other advanced economies – particularly the 2  US. Indeed, the apparent disappearance of the relationship between pay and unemployment is for me the second big puzzle in advanced economies post-crisis. The first is the related puzzle of the disappearance of productivity growth which has almost certainly been responsible for some of the weakness in pay growth but that does not explain the full weakness (Chart 2). 3  Why does this matter? The Bank of England does not target unemployment, let alone pay growth. Monetary policy makers learned, painfully, around the time unemployment was last at 4.3% that monetary policy cannot in the longer run determine real things like unemployment. Attempts to do so can result in very perverse effects. Rather, they should direct their efforts to controlling nominal things like inflation. 4  1  Of the 22 quarters over 2012-2017, whole economy total (regular) wage growth fell below 1% in five (four) of them and breached 3% in one (none). 2  While some indicators of US pay growth have partially recovered (Yellen, 2017), the general picture remains one of relatively modest pay growth.

In order to prepare our region to be as competitive as possible, policy makers, firms and workers need to accurately gauge which industries and jobs will grow fastest. Given the trend over the past few decades, it is no surprise that the new jobs being created across the region and nation are most likely to be in industries with a high share of workers with a college education. Thus, education and worker training is likely to continue to be very important in maintaining the economic vitality of our region going forward. Conclusion In summary, the recovery in our region continued at a slow pace during the second quarter of 2011. While overall job growth has been sluggish through the recovery, we find that there has been a great deal of job churning below the surface throughout our region. So far, this job churning is about evenly balanced between old and new job creation. The evidence to date is pretty clear that these new jobs, on balance, are in industries that employ workers with higher levels of skills and education. I will now ask Jaison Abel to provide additional details on the regional economy. 1  Groshen, Erica L. and Simon Potter. 2003. “Has Structural Change Contributed to a Jobless Recovery?” Federal Reserve Bank of New York Current Issues in Economics and Finance 9, no. 8. Groshen, Erica L., Potter, Simon, and Rebecca J. Sale. 2004. “Economic Restructuring in New York State.” Federal Reserve Bank of New York Current Issues in Economics and Finance 10, no. 7.
Finally, I wish you a productive and fruitful time here at the HKMA Fintech Day, and trust that you will benefit from today’s rich plenary and parallel sessions. 21. Thank you very much. 4/4  BIS central bankers' speeches

For a period of time – even perhaps a few years – wages can rise somewhat more without jeopardising the inflation target – for example, if the ratio of wages to national income is unusually low following a crisis and businesses are able to absorb some of the increase. This has been the case to an extent in the past few years. Other factors could counteract larger wage increases as well – for instance, declining foreign-currency prices of imports and a stronger króna have contributed to declining inflation even though wages have risen considerably more than the sum of the inflation target and the increase in productivity. But there are a number of indications that we will not be able to rely on these countervailing factors next year. By then, the slack will have disappeared from the economy, the ratio of wages to national income is at or above its historical average, and there are no premises for further appreciation of the króna, as the current account surplus is narrowing and the real exchange rate is no longer below its estimated equilibrium value. Nevertheless, different wage increases could be negotiated for different groups if there are grounds and will to do so. As I draw near the conclusion of my talk today, I would like to shift gears a bit and say a few words about credit ratings.
33  Legislative dates for compulsory schooling vary from dates of enforcement. Barro-Lee Educational Attainment Dataset: http://www.barrolee.com/ 35 Bolton (2012). 36 Willetts (2017). 37 Bolton (2012) for data from 1950 to 2000. 2016 data from Department of Education. 38 Bolton (2012) and Universities UK (2017). Refers to full-time first degrees only. 34  10  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches  10  Raising levels of skills and training for workers is one way of limiting the costs of technological disruption. Providing them with access to finance or housing is another. This support helped smooth the hit to incomes th  th  and lifestyles brought about by job displacement. Starting in the late 18 and early 19 centuries, at the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, financial institutions began to emerge to provide financial support through bridging loans, often operating on collective or co-operative principles. In the UK, the Friendly Societies Act of 1819 established today’s credit unions. The Regulation of Benefit Building Societies Act followed in 1836. Other sets of institution emerged to support workers in wider ways. Trade unions grew in importance during th  the 18 century, as workers’ jobs were hollowed-out and their share of the income pie was consumed. th  Unions gained rights progressively during the 19 century, culminating in the foundation of the Trade Union Congress (TUC) in 1868. The Trade Union Act of 1871 gave unions fully-fledged legal status.

35  Beyond age 18, there was in parallel a rise in both numbers and attendance at universities. For over six hundred years from 1209, England had only two universities – this one (Oxford) and the other one (Cambridge). It was not until the formation of University College London in 1829 that their duopoly was th  broken. And it was not until the 20 century that some of the other main cities – Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Bristol, Birmingham and Sheffield – established their own universities. 36  Today, there are around 130  universities in the UK as a whole. Participation rates in higher education have also undergone a secular rise and, latterly, a revolution. The share of young people attending university has increased from just over 3% in 1950 to over 8% in 1970, over 19% in 1990, 33% in 2000 and 49% by 2016. 37  Having been less than 5,000 in 1920, the number of first  degrees obtained at UK universities had increased to over 365,000 by 2016. 38  Through the rapid rise in school and university attendance, there was a revolution in cognitive skills in the workforce. That provided the human capital necessary to turn new technologies and machines into higher levels of productivity among companies, higher wages among workers and, ultimately, higher living standards among societies. Put differently, higher cognitive skills reduced the odds of a lengthy recessionary period of technological unemployment for many individuals and societies.
Even though we do not consider it particularly attractive (since we have an open capital account) or efficient – and those are the reasons why we have not used it in the last 15 years – its use cannot be ruled out under exceptional circumstances. Our powers as a financial regulator also include other dimensions that some countries have used as part of their prudential toolkit. For instance, the CBC determines the level of reserves to be kept by banks that take deposits from the public during an operating cycle (reserve requirement) and the interest yield of such resources. Several jurisdictions (e.g. China and Peru) have controlled credit growth and currency composition by imposing differentiated reserve requirements. Moreover, the CBC has the authority to regulate the relations that should exist between assets and liabilities of commercial banks, which have led to our standards of liquidity and market risks. In a nutshell, our current regulatory and legal framework, as well as the actions of financial regulators and supervisors, including the Central Bank of Chile and the Superintendency of Banks and Financial Institutions, contains elements that are consistent with a financial stability and macroprudential approach, and grants powers that may be used with these purposes if deemed necessary. 5. Final thoughts  The recent financial crisis was a reminder, especially for the developed world, of how costly a financial crisis can be and how important it is to minimize their probability of occurrence and costs, by explicitly safeguarding financial stability.

Thus, such provisions should act as a countercyclical mechanism for accumulating additional provisions when conditions are good and releasing or allocating specific provisions when the times turn bad.” The regulations on required credit risk provisions also introduce some macroprudential aspects as they establish that these must be forward-looking and based on the expected probability of future repayment, not the current level of default or delay, and consider the sensitivity to the cycle of the industry where the debtor operates. In addition, regulations establish a minimum level of provisions that does not vary with the cycle and prevents them from falling excessively during favorable cycles of payment behavior. Finally, after the crises that hit emerging economies in the late 1990s, the law ruled that banks, when assessing the financial situation of the debtors, must consider their currency, term, and interest rate mismatches. The Central Bank’s legal framework also includes a number of powers that can be used to mitigate excessive credit cycles if deemed necessary. For one, the Central Bank Board has the authority to establish reserve requirements over foreign exchange operations. This tool was used in the past (1990s) to control capital inflows to Chile and their impact on macro balances. However, our practical experience with the use of this tool in the 1990s taught us that its success in taming capital inflows is limited because it is always possible to find ways to circumvent the restrictions.
Consequently, it is clear – and well-established historically – that central banks make an important contribution to financial stability. In fact, several central banks were founded specifically for this purpose. The idea was that the central bank should serve as the lender of last resort, thereby protecting the banking system from collapse. In Switzerland, the SNB has always been the lender of last resort. In the revision of the NBA carried out ten years ago, the SNB received for the first time an explicit mandate to contribute to financial stability. The term “contribute” expresses the fact that other state institutions also have an influence on financial stability and that, in addition, this stability can never be absolutely guaranteed. Until recently, the SNB had two options for its contribution to financial stability, in addition to the monetary policy toolkit, which was mainly based on interest rates. The first was to rely on the persuasive power of its sound arguments and hope that banks and other financial market participants would draw the right conclusions from these, so that a crisis did not arise. The most important example for a persuasive approach is our annual Financial Stability Report. Since 2003, this report has conducted an assessment of the stability of the banking industry, highlighted tensions and imbalances, and made recommendations. The second option was for the SNB to provide a bank facing a crisis with emergency liquidity assistance, if this was necessary for the functioning of the financial system.

In most countries, however, this mandate is purposely defined in comparatively loose terms, with the main focus on ensuring price stability. As has become evident in the past few years, central banks have considerable room for manoeuvre in implementing this mandate. In response to the crisis, they first lowered interest rates to zero and subsequently eased monetary policy further using new kinds of instruments. At the same time, central banks had to provide the banking system with largescale liquidity assistance to ensure financial stability. As a consequence, central banks’ balance sheets have now reached levels beyond all previous imagination. In addition, many central banks have been given additional responsibilities and have taken on new tasks, in particular in the area of financial stability. The shocks triggered by the global financial crisis did not leave Switzerland unscathed either. The Swiss National Bank (SNB), therefore, had no choice but to move into uncharted waters. During the crisis, maintaining a functioning Swiss franc money market and subsequently stabilising our country’s largest bank were the first priorities. At a later stage, the massive appreciation of the Swiss franc threatened the economy at its core, creating a risk of deflation. The SNB came to the rescue by injecting liquidity into the market, setting up the StabFund, intervening in the foreign exchange market and introducing the minimum exchange rate. Our balance sheet is a reliable indicator of just how intense these interventions were.
Bwalya K E Ng’andu: Improving access to finance by the SMEs in Zambia Remarks by Dr Bwalya K E Ng’andu, Deputy Governor (Operations) of the Bank of Zambia, at the Signing Ceremony for a credit line of $ 5 million between NORFUND and BancABC Zambia, Lusaka, 1 December 2011. *  *  *  YOUR EXECELLENCY, THE NORWEGIAN AMBASSADOR, MR ARVE OFSTAD; MEMBERS OF THE DIPLOMATIC CORPS PRESENT; THE CHAIRMAN OF BANCABC ZAMBIA LIMITED, MR. CHANDA CHILESHE; THE MANAGING DIRECTOR OF BANCABC, MR. DANA BOTHA; HEAD OF THE NORFUND SOUTHERN AFRICAN OFFICE, Mr. DEEPAK MALIK; DISTINGUSIHED INVITED GUESTS; MEMBERS OF THE PRESS; LADIES AND GENTLEMEN. Let me begin by thanking BancABC for inviting me to be the guest of honour at this very important event, where we will witness the signing of a credit line worth US $ million between BancABC and the Norwegian Investment Fund for Developing Countries (NORFUND). It is pleasing to know that the credit line to be signed this morning is specifically tailored to provide financial support to Small and Medium scale enterprises (SMEs). The development of the SME sector and its potential to contribute to aggregate productivity growth, economic growth and development have been stifled by the generally limited access to finance. The credit line to be signed today is an important milestone in improving access to finance by the SMEs in the country. Equally as important as access to finance is the price of financing that is placed at the disposal of SMEs.

National demand is estimated to hold on a mildly slowing path, and there will be further improvements in the contribution of net external demand. This profile would be in line with the macroeconomic scenario on the basis of which the State budget for 2007 has been prepared, although the starting point is somewhat higher growth rates in 2006. As to inflation, although the growth of the CPI in 2007 on average will be far below that of the current year if cheaper oil takes root, it is clear that there will only be significant headway in inflation rate convergence with the euro area if this reduction in energy prices feeds through permanently to agents' expectations. We are therefore faced with a picture of sustained growth and some gradual correction to certain imbalances in the Spanish economy. Yet this scenario is not free from risks in the medium term. On the international front I have already mentioned risks relative to the outlook for the world economy and the uncertainty over the intensity of the European recovery. Furthermore, oil prices are subject to the influence of numerous economic and geopolitical factors, any changes in which may prompt a reversal of the fall seen in recent months. Within Spain, both the persistent inflation differential with the euro area and the high indebtedness of Spanish households harbour uncertainties that economic policy should contribute to dispel. The maintenance of price increases higher than those in the euro area over a lengthy period is a cause for concern.