samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
A key facet of the economic reforms has been the active participation of the private sector in all aspects of the economy particularly in the manufacturing, construction and services sectors. Now turning to the Kingdom’s goals and aspirations for the next decades. We have a clear vision that Saudi Arabia will represent an industrial hub among the region's countries, leveraging off on its strategic location, competitive supply of energy, size of the local market, ease of access to global markets, and the growing partnerships between the public and private sectors. This strategy fulfils our State’s goal of diversifying our economic production base away from Oil. For this purpose, we have encouraged and will continue to encourage the private sector by providing attractive incentives, including the setting up of industrial zones in various parts of the country, equipping them with various infrastructural facilities and by increasing the capital base of specialized credit institutions to provide long-term loans to entrepreneurs. Nevertheless, the Saudi economy is facing a number of challenges the most important of which is the increasing rate of inflation. Although inflation was less than 1 percent on average in the last two decades, it rose to 2.2 percent in 2006 and it continued to increase during the last months, exceeding 4 percent in last August according to the Central Department of Statistics and Information. Our concern is that factors that caused accelerating inflation are still in existence.

Hamad Al-Sayari: Economic and structural policy reforms in Saudi Arabia Speech by His Excellency Hamad Al-Sayari, Governor of the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency, at the Institute of International Finance, INC MENA Regional Economic Forum, Riyadh, 7 November 2007. *  *  *  It is a great pleasure for me to welcome you at this important gathering organized by the Institute of International Finance and hosted by the National Commercial Bank. I would like to thank the organizers for inviting me to speak to this distinguished audience. I understand that for the next two days, the participants will be deliberating on the state of the global economy in general and the opportunities and challenges facing the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) economies in particular. The Gulf Cooperation Council Countries (GCC) are an important constituent of the MENA region, a marketplace that is undergoing significant transformation where the member countries are opening up their markets and significant structural policy reforms are taking place. Let me begin by providing you with an overview of the ongoing economic liberalization and structural policy reforms currently underway in the Kingdom. Since the discovery of oil in the early 1930s, the oil sector has remained the linchpin of Saudi Arabian economy. Nevertheless over the past three decades, a strategic decision was made to diversify and expand the base of our economy.
It is the most significant step since towards a united Europe and is exactly in the spirit of how the founding fathers of Europe wanted the EU to evolve since the introduction of the euro. The role of the Governor of the BdF like that of the President of the Bundesbank will increasingly be that of an important player on the European field, and much less at the national level. In Germany, we tend to believe that the role of national central banks is shrinking. C.N. At the Banque de France, some of my colleagues thought that one day the ECB could replace us. I told them that it would not happen as we are in a federal system with a relatively small centre. Within the Governing Council we take common decisions but most of the work is done by the national central banks. But from now on we will have to work differently, for example, instead of looking for the best payment system for France, we must look for the best payment system for the euro area as a whole. In this respect, our best partner has mostly been the Bundesbank. But the relationship seems to have become more distant? BIS central bankers’ speeches  3  C.N. No, certainly not. The Bundesbank remains our number one partner. We may start with different approaches on some of the issues in the Governing Council but in the vast majority of cases we have the same responses.

Prominent among the measures that have been announced or that are pending approval or final design include occupational pension schemes, a review of maximum social security contribution bases and maximum pensions, a new contribution system for self-employed workers, and a review of the reference period for calculating the regulatory base. In recent years, the Banco de España has, in various documents and reports, set out certain principles that should govern the pension reform. First, once the level of benefits the system should provide has been established at the political level, it is crucial that the strategy be rounded off by setting revenue levels and other system parameters (e.g. the retirement age) to ensure the system’s funding. As part of this strategy, it would also be desirable to strengthen the link between contributions made and benefits received – ensuring a sufficient level for the most vulnerable households –, and to analyse the consequences of the reforms envisaged in terms of redistribution and intergenerational equity, to ensure that any adjustments to the system do not fall disproportionately on specific population groups, such as the retired population or future cohorts of workers. The system should also be made more transparent and easier to plan for, to offer greater certainty to the population and facilitate decision-making as regards saving, work and retirement. In this respect, automatic adjustment mechanisms could possibly be introduced, to adapt certain system parameters to changes in demographic and economic dynamics.
I draw attention to these limitations of the Spanish economy at a particular juncture in which foreign direct investment is slowing considerably (FDI having been one of the main channels for the diffusion of technological advances), and in which the weight of high-technology imports remains very limited, despite the surge in import penetration. The prolongation of the current trends might mean that the industries most exposed to foreign competition have to adjust their staffing levels in order to maintain their business margins. Hence the importance of creating an environment conducive to technological innovation and to higher productivity, which I shall refer to later. The second area where risks have arisen from the extended expansionary phase of the economy is related, as earlier indicated, to the ongoing buoyancy of household spending on consumption and residential investment. This variable has been favoured by the notable generosity of financing conditions, and this has given rise to certain pressures on the financial position of Spanish households. As is known, household debt last year held on the upward course it has been following since the mid-nineties, clearly exceeding 100% of the sector’s gross disposable income. This new peak marks a departure from the average levels of the euro area and is beginning to draw closer to that of countries such as the United States.

The lacklustre consumption and investment of recent years are telling in this connection, and denote the presence of structural shortcomings which dampen household confidence and dent corporate profit expectations. Accordingly, questions such as the uncertainty over the viability of the public pension system currently in place or the constraints preventing higher productivity growth not only have long-term repercussions but also exert a contractionary effect on the present economic situation. These overall characteristics of the area do not apply to all the member economies. Growth rates vary considerably, largely due to the different degrees of vigour shown by internal demand. Amid these divergences, Spain is one of the countries that has consistently posted substantially higher-thanaverage rates of expansion. The Eurosystem monetary policy has retained an accommodative stance, with the intervention rate set in June 2003 unchanged at 2%. Although the forceful oil shock has hampered the reduction of inflation, medium-term inflation expectations have held at a rate compatible with the Eurosystem’s definition of price stability, partly as a result of sustained wage moderation. The favourable trend of labour costs is a natural corollary of the prevailing sluggishness of activity and of employment creation, but it also reflects the credibility of the anti-inflationary goal of monetary policy. The European Central Bank has been able to sustain monetary conditions propitious to the strengthening of activity although, as indicated earlier, these have so far proven insufficient to achieve a satisfactory degree of dynamism.
the competition situation both abroad and in the home market and developments in costs and profit margins for both producers and distributors. To better understand why inflation is so low, the next step is to analyse the various stages from the production or importing of goods until the goods are put up for sale to consumers in shops. Allow me to begin by looking at developments in the producer prices of domestic goods and in the prices of imported goods at customs, i.e. the prices paid by wholesalers in the distribution sector. I will then analyse how the path through the distribution sector can be thought to affect the final price of the goods that customers buy in shops, i.e. the price in the CPI. Producer prices of domestically produced goods The rate of increase for producer prices of domestically produced consumer goods has been very low since the beginning of 2003 but has risen weakly from 0.5 per cent to about 1 per cent in February this year (Chart 4). The main driver of a company’s production costs, and thereby the price of its products, is the costs of intermediate goods and labour costs. Intermediate goods costs in manufacturing dropped in 2002 and 2003, after which they increased by 2.3 per cent in 2004 according to the National Institute of Economic Research’s estimates (Chart 5). Product prices have by and large followed the cost developments for intermediate goods, even though changes in the costs of intermediate goods do not feed through fully to product prices.

We have also underscored time and again that the rule only helps us part of the way. There may be reason to depart from it. The Riksbank’s clarification of monetary policy in 1999 explains when this may be the case. One reason is the occurrence of a shock that has caused inflation to deviate considerably from target. In such cases there may be a risk of undesirable fluctuations in the real economy if we were to try to bring inflation back to target within the normal time horizon. We have to be able to make allowances for such circumstances; otherwise they could have serious repercussions for the real economy. And our monetary policy framework provides scope for this. But no two situations are ever exactly the same. It is necessary to have a thorough analysis on which to base our standpoints and an explanation for our decisions. Another reason to deviate from the policy rule is if inflation is judged to be influenced by temporary effects, i.e. effects that will diminish without any monetary policy intervention. That, for example, is why we often focus our discussion on UND1X, the measure of underlying inflation that excludes the effects of indirect taxes and subsidies as well as interest rate changes. But it can also be a case of temporary supply shocks that are not expected to persist, such as the sharp rise in electricity prices at the turn of the year 2002/2003.
As I said earlier, I believe that we must take the risks associated with financial imbalances into account in our monetary policy decisions as the level of household indebtedness is so high. Why not lower the repo rate more when unemployment is high? One of the arguments put forward for further repo-rate cuts is that unemployment is high (see Figure 14). I have a lot of understanding for this argument. So why not cut the repo rate more? Here I would like to point out once again that we have lowered the repo rate and the repo-rate path several times over the last 12 months, partly with particular reference to unemployment. However, our analysis shows that the relatively high rate of unemployment also reflects structural problems. For example, there are signs that the matching of job-seekers with job vacancies has deteriorated in recent years, which makes it difficult to reduce unemployment. Figure 15 clearly shows that while the number of unemployed in non-vulnerable groups has fallen in recent years, the number of unemployed in the more vulnerable groups has instead increased. 6 This illustrates the matching problems on the Swedish labour market. But even while focusing on unemployment, monetary policy must take a long-term view and strive to avoid problems further ahead. A low repo rate may provide short-term gains, but “if we go too far down that road” problems will be waiting for us, including problems regarding unemployment.

After the global recession of 2009, the recovery has been imbalanced between developed and emerging economies. Among developed ones, especially those that encountered problems in their financial systems during the crisis, are growing below trend. BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  Thus, the main developed economies are still enduring high unemployment rates. Stimulus measures adopted during the recession helped the world economy to begin recovering. But private demand remains weak in the advanced world and inflation, both headline and core, is still contained. Households, banks and governments in the main developed economies are facing a fragile financial situation. Within this context, the process of de-leveraging and restoring the damaged balance sheets will take some time. Such a scenario has called for additional monetary expansion measures and postponing interest rate normalization in those economies. The dollar has depreciated in global markets (figure 2) while in the U.S., additional fiscal stimulus packages have been adopted and in Europe fiscal adjustment plans are being applied. In emerging markets, especially in Asia and Latin America, economic activity has been growing strongly, although it is expected to converge to trend levels during 2011. As a response to this and to signs of increased inflation, emerging economies are gradually withdrawing their fiscal and monetary stimulus packages. Differences in the growth outlook, risk perceptions and interest rates have created conditions that favor capital flows towards these economies (figure 3).
Core inflation, on the other hand, which excludes food and energy, remained stable at 0.9%. For us, the overall inflation rate is the key figure because we protect the purchasing power of citizens, albeit in the “medium term”, not on a month-to-month basis. Given the current high variability of energy prices, indicators of the underlying price dynamics say more about future developments than about the overall inflation rate. We still assume that, because of energy prices, the overall inflation rate will rise until the middle of this year – reaching our “comfort zone”. But one swallow doesn’t make a summer. For in the second half of the year, it is likely to fall again and then reach 1.5% in 2018. So, subdued inflation will be with us for quite some time, but the spectre of deflation has disappeared from the radar of market participants. For this recovery to gain traction, we have to keep our word. The adjustments to our asset purchase programme will be implemented as announced in December – because, first, it contributes significantly to the economic recovery and stabilisation on the price front. And second, monetary policy in times of heightened uncertainty must be a guarantor of stability and 2/5  BIS central bankers' speeches  reliability by being credible. And yet, at the same time, how much longer can we continue to talk about “even lower rates” as being a monetary policy option?

And by offering targeted longer-term refinancing on favourable terms which reward additional lending, we have made it possible for banks to cut their interest rates, a move which has led to increased lending. All these measures in recent years have contributed to the economic recovery in the euro area. Thus, both the demand for, and supply of, credit is rising. In the real economy, too, positive surprises have predominated recently. The growth rate in the fourth quarter of last year rose to 0.5 %. In the euro area, the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate fell to 9.6% in December. In November it was 0.1 percentage point higher and in December of the previous year it was still at 10.5%. Overall, the prospects for economic growth in the euro area are increasingly positive. However, while the data within the monetary union is pointing to growth risks being more and more in equilibrium, uncertainty and the risk of political shocks outside continental Europe have clearly gone up. To put it another way: while the economic outlook for the euro area is steadily brightening, dark clouds are building up on the political horizon beyond the continent. But of course we shall pay particular attention to how prices evolve. The annual rate of inflation rose, according to provisional estimates by Eurostat in January, by 0.7 percentage point to 1.8%. This sharp jump in the rate of inflation is largely attributable to volatile components, namely energy and, to a somewhat lesser extent, food.
13.06.2023  Productivity, sustainable growth and prosperity 45th anniversary of Cinco Días Madrid Pablo Hernández de Cos Governor *IEnglish translation from the original in Spanish  Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to begin by thanking Amanda Mars, the Managing Editor of Cinco Días, for inviting me to take part in this event to mark the newspaper's 45th anniversary. Since 1978, a year that also saw the approval of the Spanish constitution, this newspaper has daily reported on and appraised the most important issues for our economy. It has thus been able to testify to the changes that have swept through the country, which have yielded very marked improvements in its citizens' well-being. Over the past 45 years Spain has witnessed cumulative growth in gross domestic product (GDP) and in consumption, both expressed per capita and in real terms, of 83% and 60%, respectively. This should not come as a surprise. The economic literature highlights the positive impact democratic institutions can have on economic growth, thanks, among other factors, to improvements in the business climate, private investment and the opening up of trade, as well as to greater fiscal capacity and spending on essential public goods, such as education and health. In the case of Spain, these changes have been further enhanced by the European integration process. For instance, the economy’s degree of external openness, measured in terms of the weight of exports and imports in GDP, has increased by almost 50 percentage points (pp).

The network of trade unions and branches would provide the life insurance co-op with a clear advantage over private enterprise. 4. To ensure that the co-op would succeed, the realist in Dr Goh laid down a few principles for its operation. First, the co-op must be fully competitive with private enterprises and cannot expect privileged treatment from the Government. Second, the co-op must have effective management. Third, all levels of staff should be recruited based on merit and not affiliations with the labour movement or government. It was the steadfast adherence to these sound principles that has kept INCOME successful over the past 40 years. The growth of Singapore’s insurance industry 5. At INCOME’s 30th anniversary celebration, I had sketched out the changes in the global financial landscape, and how MAS had to liberalise the domestic insurance industry. Reputable foreign insurers were allowed to set up in Singapore or enter into strategic alliances with existing local insurers. The hope was for the entry of new players to engender competition, which would in turn promote greater innovation and raise the efficiency of the incumbent insurers. MAS also worked on deepening the local talent pool and fine-tuned the already prudent regulatory framework. 6. Ten years on, these efforts have yielded significant results. The Singapore insurance industry, which saw a number of acquisitions, consolidations and new entrants, experienced strong growth, with total assets tripling to $ over the past decade. The industry has also matured in terms of the breadth and depth of products and services offered.
Research, including the PRA’s own analysis of survey responses from UK firms, suggests that the fixed costs of implementing new requirements can be proportionally higher for small firms than for large ones when measured as a fraction of a firm’s assets.7 What this tells us is that there are economies of scale when it comes to compliance costs and that some costs fall relatively heavier on small firms than on large firms. At the same time, separate research by Bank staff shows that prudential requirements that are well-matched with the risks that cause large banks to fail are not so well-matched with those that cause small banks to fail.8 Putting this evidence together, we can ask whether there are requirements which are relatively more costly for small firms to implement but which deliver fewer benefits than when they are applied to large firms. And that is what we do in this Discussion Paper. Having identified requirements which do not make a material  6  Amadxarif et al.

I will have more to say about this term because – ironically – simplicity is not itself a simple idea. I will therefore explain what we mean by ‘simple’ and how that gives rise to some important design choices for the simpler regime. We know that banking regulation doesn’t always seem simple. Research by Bank staff has documented a near-doubling in the length of UK banking regulation since the financial crisis of 2007-2008 to almost three quarters of a million words.6 It won’t surprise you to hear that I’m firmly convinced that new rules were needed to address vulnerabilities which that crisis revealed. But I also recognize that we have a complexity problem when we have more rules than we need. That can happen when we apply all of our rules to all the firms we supervise. Some of the rules we need for big, complex firms might not be needed for smaller firms. One problem with complexity is that it brings costs. Firms must spend money interpreting rules and operationalising requirements and, as with other sorts of overheads, some of these costs are fixed costs which are the same for all firms regardless of their size.