samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
These monetary policy meetings will be held 8–10 times a year and the minutes will be published with a time lag of 6–8 weeks. Monetary policy matters may, of course, appear on the agenda in the intervals between these meetings, particularly as repo rate decisions are normally made once a fortnight and announced for the coming two weeks. In the normal course of events, however, it is envisaged that repo rate decisions will be based on the discussions at monetary policy meetings. So it is only under special circumstances that monetary policy will need to be discussed more comprehensively in between the meetings specifically reserved for this. For the Riksbank, this is a new procedure. The time when decisions will be announced is also new. In future, monetary policy decisions will be published on Fridays at 9.30am, though there may be exceptions to this rule in certain cases, such as the publication of the Inflation Report. Judging from their newsletters, it seems to me that so far most market players have understood our new arrangements. That is a good thing and also important. There may be situations in which members of the Executive Board reach divergent conclusions. That will necessitate a more formal voting procedure. The outcome will be recorded in the minutes. No mention of a vote indicates that the Board agreed unanimously; otherwise, members with dissenting opinions will be named. Disagreement on the Executive Board is clearly not something that is desirable as such.

I am, indeed, convinced that each of the six members will aim for as collegiate an attitude as possible. To me, this is already evident from the work to date. But it is also the case that, in making monetary policy, a variety of factors have to be weighted into an overall assessment of inflation’s future path. In weighing up the odds, different people may reach different conclusions, which need not be an entirely bad thing. It might even have the advantage of demonstrating that decisions on the monetary policy stance tend to involve assessments that are complex and tricky. From interviews and comments in the press, it is already evident that members of the Executive Board voice somewhat different shades of opinion in their inflation assessments. This, too, is something that all those who follow monetary policy will have to get used to. It is, moreover, an assurance that our discussions in the Riksbank will be properly informed about aspects of the BIS Review 14/1999  –2–  monetary policy stance. It is also consistent with the transparency that the Riksbank is striving for and which is a basic condition for the new legislation. The monetary policy situation Sweden’s economy in perspective In the years since the crisis in the early 1990s, economic development in Sweden has been rather good. Growth has been relatively high, yet inflation has been kept at a low level. Since summer 1993, annual GDP growth has averaged almost 3%.
But from my experience as a practitioner I think it derives in the main from another factor: the goal of harmonising regulation and supervision across 28 countries. It is entirely natural that this latter point should lead to a system in which a greater volume of the detail gets locked down in legislation as opposed to regulators’ rules. It is also entirely natural to ask whether such an approach would make sense for the UK once outside the EU. This question for Government and Parliament will also need to take into account the issue of EU market access, which could in some scenarios lead to greater alignment. Alternatively, we could adopt a hybrid approach which doesn’t replicate either of the pre-existing EU or British approaches. Once you open this box the possibilities are legion. For instance, one could imagine a ‘design vs calibration’ split (design in legislation, calibration in rules), or a wholesale/retail split with more of the wholesale framework in legislation in order to keep closer to the EU. Conclusion  At some point in the Brexit process, the question may arise for the Government and Parliament: what framework for financial regulation do we want to have in the UK? What style do we want to adopt? As for stringency, we can assure foreign banks’ chief executives that we have no plans to upgrade our regulatory dress code to white-tie-only, and we can assure our colleagues in the EU that we have absolutely no desire to take off our clothes!

This is particularly the case for prices for domestically produced goods influenced by world market prices. The fall in prices for imported consumer goods is not solely attributable to exchange rate developments. Clothing prices have exhibited a falling trend over the past few years. In October 2003, clothing prices were 13.7 per cent lower than in the same month one year earlier, and almost 30 per cent lower than in 1995. In addition to low external price inflation for these goods, lower tariffs for clothing have translated into lower consumer prices. The removal of quota regulations has also led to a shift in clothing imports away from high-cost countries to countries with considerably lower production costs. The same trend has been observed for the audiovisual industry. Since the mid-1990s, prices for audiovisual equipment have fallen markedly. In October, prices for these goods were 8.5 per cent lower than one year earlier. International producers have moved production to low-cost countries, allowing them to reduce prices charged to Norwegian importers. In addition, new technology and intensified international competition have exerted downward pressure on prices. Global economic growth has been considerably weaker than expected. Changes in the economic outlook are clearly reflected in interest rate expectations. In the US, these expectations have been adjusted downwards considerably since summer 2002. At that time, market participants expected the key rate in the US to be increased to about 4 per cent towards the end of 2003.
The implications of that fact should be remembered when assessing the course of changes in the previously centrally planned economies. The transition in Central and Eastern Europe is inevitably a much more complex and longer-term phenomenon, for which no generalised theory could be available to apply. Such radical transformation requires a feasible strategy implemented with wide political support of the population. Transformation requires some minimum speed, and must start with some “critical mass” of change to secure sufficient impact on the behaviour of economic agents. In individual Central European post-communist countries, the sequence, speed, BIS Review 25/1997  -2-  and forms of individual steps necessarily differed; they had different starting conditions, different degrees of political support of the new governments, and they also applied different strategies. The Czechoslovak case At the start of transformation in 1990, Czechoslovakia had some economic advantages over the other Central and East European post-communist countries. In Czechoslovakia, during the preceding decade, state budgets were mostly balanced, foreign debt was low, and the balance of payments showed no big deficits or surpluses. Inflation was relatively low. Even if there was an inflationary potential (reflected not only in open inflation but also in the forms of hidden and repressed inflation) and the monetary overhang was increasing in the 1980s, its dimensions continued to be considerably lower than in the other countries of Central and Eastern Europe. Czechoslovakia, especially the Czech Republic, also had the advantage of a long industrial history, and of well-educated and skilled labour.

Dear colleagues, •  Before proceeding with the presentations and discussions today, let me share a few words on the experience of the BNB which provides examples, relevant for the topic of today’s conference. •  We have seen that the compatibility of monetary, micro- and macro-prudential policies is possible in reality, and not only in theory. The BNB has successfully implemented such a policy mix for many years, during all stages of the economic cycles, before and during the recent global crisis. •  We have also seen that it may take years and perhaps at least one serious financial or banking crisis, to design and then enforce central banking policies which are optimal for a country. In Bulgaria the policymakers, legislators and the public at large came to the consensus of introducing the currency board regime and the very strict banking supervision and regulations. This happened only after our own deep financial and banking crisis which took place in the mid-1990s. Our experience has convinced us that there are no universally superior or “one-size-fits-all” frameworks. Neither in the areas of monetary policy and banking supervision, nor in the design of regulatory structures or the governance of central banks. Alongside the processes of financial integration and global regulations and practices, which are inevitable, we believe that countries should be allowed to retain sufficient levels of flexibility to apply countryspecific solutions.
Those as long in the tooth as me will know that, even in nominal terms, it costs less to buy a pair of jeans and a t-shirt today than it did thirty or forty years ago. The result is a significant contribution to real income growth over that period. In what follows I’ll flesh out these numbers a little further and say something too about their distributional effects. (One particular point in this respect is that the real income benefit of lower import prices is probably most marked for those at the lower end of the distribution.) I’ll mention the parallels, long recognised by economists, between the effects of growing trade and those of technical progress, and the role of the latter in rising inequality in the US. I’ll conclude with some remarks about the sort of things economists might have to think about as the UK leaves the EU. Globalisation and its effects on UK clothing Globalisation hasn’t occurred smoothly nor is there a single, discrete date at which it began. Its broad features are reasonably clear in Charts 1 and 2. Chart 1: Globalisation: a timeline  Source: NBER Macrohistory Database and Barclays calculations (Keller et al 2017)  1  D. N. McCloskey, "The Industrial Revolution in Britain 1780-1860: A Survey," in Roderick Floud and Donald McCloskey, The Economic History of Britain since 1700.

Pablo Hernández de Cos: Close of the 2019/20 academic year Speech by Mr Pablo Hernández de Cos, Governor of the Bank of Spain and Chair of the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, at the Centro de Estudios Monetarios y Financieros (CEMFI), Madrid, 10 July 2020. * * * Good afternoon class of 2020. Good afternoon dear colleagues, friends and families. It is a pleasure for me to participate in this virtual graduation ceremony together with Mari Luz Morán, Rector of Universidad Internacional Menéndez Pelayo, Susanna Esteban, Director of the Master Program, and Rafael Repullo, Director of CEMFI. I would especially like to thank the Rector for being here today. The partnership with Universidad Internacional Menéndez Pelayo dating back to 2006 has been instrumental in improving our ability to attract excellent students and the quality of our graduate program, and I am very grateful for this. Before I begin, let me acknowledge everyone whose hard work has made this online celebration possible, especially the CEMFI administrative and IT staff. The world into which this class of 2020 is graduating is a fundamentally different one from what we expected just a few months back. The coronavirus pandemic has caused the loss of many lives and affected the livelihood of millions of people worldwide.
Vittorio Corbo: Monetary policy in emerging countries – the view from Chile Speech by Mr Vittorio Corbo, Governor of the Central Bank of Chile, at the Bank of Italy, Rome, 18 June 2007. Prepared for presentation at Banca d’Italia. I thank Marcelo Ochoa and Ivonne Vera for assistance and Klaus Schmidt-Hebbel and Andrea Tokman for suggestions and comments. *  *  *  Emerging economies have recorded major progress in the conduct and results of monetary policy during the last two decades. This achievement is due to implementation of more robust and transparent monetary regimes, complemented by adoption of flexible exchange rates, sustainable fiscal policies, and stronger financial systems. Among emerging economies, Chile’s experience is of particular interest. It shows that monetary stability can be attained as a result of coherent policies, overcoming decades of macroeconomic instability and weak credibility. This presentation documents the improvement of monetary policy conduct and results in emerging economies in general and Chile in particular. Section 1 summarizes the overall trend and specific components of macroeconomic adjustment observed in emerging economies. Chile’s transition toward its current monetary policy framework, based on full-fledged inflation targeting, is described next. Section 3 analyzes and documents the results of improved monetary policy in emerging economies and in Chile during the last two decades. Brief conclusions close the presentation. 1. Macroeconomic adjustment in emerging economies  Macroeconomic management in emerging markets has improved substantially in the last decade.

The increased public investments in the infrastructure, provided by still comfortable fiscal position (the budget deficit was on average 3% of GDP during the crisis and the government debt is at 34% of GDP, the forth lowest in the Europe) are additional factor for growth. However, although the negative spillover effects of the global and Euro zone crisis to the trade, remittances and FDI’s could be diminished as Euro zone recover, still, the financial system of our SEE countries, that is broadly based on banks, is exposed to the risk of disruptive withdrawal of funds by European banks. Thus, when we assess the crisis’s impact on the financial system in our economies, we should distinguish the two phases. In the first phase of the global crisis, the negative spillover effects were pronounced on the local capital markets, with large portfolio withdrawals by institutional investors. On the other side, in that time, the Vienna Initiative has prevented a systemic banking crisis. However, with the new wave of the Eurozone crisis (extended at the end of 2011), there are many new challenges for SEE countries that should be rightly followed by Vienna Initiative 2. Concerns with respect to Euro zone banks’ deleveraging, due to new capital requirements by the EBA are materialized. The deleveraging by the Euro zone parent banks have affected the SEE credits’ developments and now there is new concern regarding to the upcoming asset-quality review and stress test of the Euro zone banks that could lengthen this process even further.
Malta has the ability to develop a regional cluster in these areas, attracting students and patients from the region and beyond. This year we have seen a significant correction in the exchange rate, which is expected to exert a positive influence on economic growth in the year ahead. There are other major elements that add to Malta’s positive outlook. In addition to being an efficient and profitable international business location, Malta is a meeting point of cultures and languages at the centre of the Mediterranean. There is, therefore, potential for further development of economic activities that exploit our location, our strengths in doing business from Malta that add value to current activities, such as, for example, developing further cultural niches in the tourism sector so as to maintain a vibrant and evolving economy. Thank you  BIS central bankers’ speeches  9

Although these imbalances declined slightly in 2016, they are still at levels similar to those in 2014, when the sectoral countercyclical capital buffer (CCyB) was set at 2%. 1 Final requirements refer to the requirements that will apply after expiry of all transitional provisions, and in particular to the qualitative requirements for going-concern capital. Page 2/3  Berne, 15 June 2017 Fritz Zurbrügg  News conference  Second, the average interest rate margin of domestically focused banks decreased in 2016, having stabilised at a low level in the previous year. This renewed reduction in the interest margin highlights the considerable pressure which these banks continue to face in their core business, in an environment of exceptionally low interest rates. At the same time, however, banks’ net interest income and reported profits increased. This is mainly because the growth in mortgage volume more than offset the reduction in the interest rate margin. Third, the resilience of domestically focused banks remains adequate. In terms of both riskweighted assets and leverage ratios, they are well capitalised by historical standards, and their capital surpluses currently exceed the regulatory minimum requirements. SNB stress tests indicate that the surpluses at most of these banks are large enough to absorb losses under adverse scenarios. That is the SNB’s evaluation of the current situation at domestically focused commercial banks; but what about our assessment of the outlook? Here, the predominant feature is again the margin pressure that I have just mentioned.
The IMF’s projection is just over four percent for real global GDP growth. The consensus of private forecasters sees growth in Europe and Japan close to estimates of potential, or in the neighborhood of two percent. Growth in the major emerging markets looks impressive, reflecting not only the benefits of a positive external environment, but also the impact of better economic leadership and policies more supportive of macroeconomic stability and reduced external vulnerability. In China, officials now seem more confident that they have induced the desired moderation in growth to a more sustainable, but still high pace of growth. The global economy has weathered the oil price shock quite well. If the long term futures prices are right, we need to be prepared to live with the possibility of a sustained period of higher oil prices, and perhaps more volatility in oil prices, and the world seems to be getting itself more prepared for that prospect. In the financial markets, this broadly positive outlook has been accompanied by a dramatic reduction in risk premia, leaving the price of insurance unusually low against a less favorable or more volatile environment. These developments imply a view among market participants that future macroeconomic shocks will be more moderate than in the past and more likely to be absorbed without broader damage to economic performance or the financial system. They reflect a general increase in confidence that monetary authorities here and in other countries can keep inflation stable at appropriately moderate levels.

By 2007, they had reached zero – bliss point for global capital market integration. Yet bliss was short-lived. 2007 proved to be a high-water mark. The onset of the financial crisis has resulted in significant capital market retrenchment as nation states have returned money home, placed regulatory ring-fences around assets and imposed restrictions on capital movement. Today, global capital market integration is back to levels last seen in 2000 and is still falling. This retrenchment reflects nervousness about the dark side of globalisation, its fragility and contagious cost. And this nervousness is not confined to capital flows; it has affected flows of goods, services and people too. That is why the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) latest round of negotiations has been on-going for nearly 12 years. And it is why policy debates about immigration restrictions in a great many advanced economies are so vexed. These are attempts to turn the tide or at least stem the flood. The costs of a significant retreat in flows of capital, goods, services and people are difficult to quantify. They are not, however, difficult to imagine. We need only look back to the aftermath of the First World War for a case study. Then, trade barriers were erected, capital flows restricted, immigration controls imposed. What followed was not a halcyon period for the global social, economic and financial order. 4  BIS central bankers’ speeches  Reversing the rising tide of information would be an even more Canute-like task.
But this is not only a conference about monetary policy in developed economies. Indeed, securities from emerging markets fit naturally into the category of riskier assets that are expected to be affected by investors’ search for yield in an environment of low interest rates, as has been documented by a growing and exciting empirical literature. This will be the topic  2  BIS central bankers’ speeches  of the third and final session of the conference, and will include presentations by Helene Rey, Simon Gilchrist, and Elias Albagli. This topic is of particular concern for central bankers and policymakers in LATAM and other emerging regions, which have good reasons to be worried with the consequences of US monetary normalization in an environment where further exchange rate pass-through will put increasing pressure on our inflation targets, while at the same time interest rate pass-through puts increased pressure on subpar levels of growth. Before giving an official start to our nineteenth annual conference, let me end by stressing a related but perhaps less appreciated aspect by which the events of the last few years have changed, I believe in both a fundamental and desirable manner, the way monetary policy is handled and communicated. And if you permit me, I will illustrate the point using the recent Chilean experience. In Chile, although economic conditions have been far less complex than in developed countries, we have also experimented with unconventional policies ... and frankly, I think the experience has been successful.

A particular benefit was that we were able to access deeper and private information not available to analysts to run the tests; the resultant reports and briefing sessions are always attended with great interest by the market. Charlotte Gerken Executive Director, Insurance Supervision  Annex  ©2023 Bank of England