samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
We are in possession of information of how certain so-called charities have been able to even hoodwink international agencies to donate funds to them for, seemingly, charitable or humanitarian causes, but which have, instead, been channeled for the upkeep of terrorist cadres and the provision of supplies to assist the terrorist effort. Natural disasters such as the Tsunami have also unwittingly lent a humanitarian face and ample cover to such activities. We, therefore, urge the co-operation of global and regional countries to trace and eliminate such funding programmes and to be extremely vigilant when dealing with organizations which may well be front organizations to finance terrorism. In this respect it need hardly be emphasized that financial intelligence sharing is fundamental to this strategy. The FTRA enables the FIUs to enter into agreements with other FIUs to exchange information. Obviously therefore, as our FIU moves forward, we will give this matter our highest priority. The International Monetary Fund has estimated that the aggregate amounts of funds laundered in the world could range between 2 to 5 per cent of the global GDP. Given the estimated global GDP of approximately USD 48 Trillion, this could range between USD 1 - 2.4 Trillion. Accordingly, by any estimate the size of the problem is gigantic and merits the focus of all jurisdictions. Missions from agencies such as the IMF and World Bank have identical goals in terms of money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism.

I am pleased to announce today three initiatives aimed at further improving efficiency and liquidity in the Singapore dollar corporate debt market. 40. First, MAS will provide swap liquidity to primary dealer banks handling Singapore dollar debt issuance for foreign corporates. These offshore entities usually have no need for the Singapore dollar funds raised and mostly swap them into a foreign currency, usually US dollars. Although the pricing mechanism in the foreign exchange and cross currency swap market is efficient, swap markets have a tendency towards one-way flow because of Singapore’s excess savings over investments. This can lead to uncertainty in the pricing process of the bond issuance. We will therefore support swap transactions at marketdetermined prices, which will ultimately enable swap market liquidity to build in the longer tenors. 41. Second, MAS will partner the industry to create a Singapore dollar corporate debt securities lending platform, from which key players will be able to borrow securities for market making. By providing greater assurance that banks will be able to deliver any given security, this platform will reduce the risk of market makers being squeezed in the event they are unable to short-cover the bonds they have sold. Improved market liquidity will mean that asset managers can be more certain of their ability to enter and exit their positions with minimal price slippage. 42. Third, MAS has initiated a price discovery platform where market participants will contribute end-of-day prices for a universe of Singapore dollar corporate bonds.
Banks of all shapes and sizes have the opportunity to benefit from the recovery in the Hong Kong economy when it comes. Some banks will however do better than others, and our research indicates that a more efficiently operated and diversified bank will achieve higher profits. I hope that all the banks sitting here today will be among those that fall into this category. BIS Review 32/2003  3

BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  The other is the Executives’ Meeting of East Asia-Pacific Central Banks or EMEAP, which have helped develop the capital market in the region through the establishment of the Asian Bond Fund and many other initiatives. The increasingly important role of China to the Thai economy and financial system has brought about the need for broader and deeper understanding of the Chinese economy and a more proactive response from public agencies, including the Bank of Thailand, to seek a presence in China. Your Royal Highness, Ladies and Gentlemen, Following the initial foothold in the form of two representative offices in New York and London twenty years ago, the Bank of Thailand recently established a representative office here in Beijing. The Beijing office is our first representative office in Asia. I also believe that we are the first central bank from the ASEAN region to have its representative office in China. But, being the first is not the only measure of success for our journey here. Since its establishment last year, our Beijing representative office has fulfilled its objectives to further promote closer ties between the Bank of Thailand and the People’s Bank of China, as well as other Chinese government agencies. The office also aims to sharpen its focus and first-hand understanding of the economic and financial developments in China. This achievement is well-illustrated by the deepening financial cooperation between China and Thailand.
  The majority of bids, both by number and size, have been against narrow collateral.   Clearing spreads against both narrow and wider collateral have been similar across operations of the same maturity (Chart 8). 6 month auctions for wider collateral have commanded a significant premium compared to the 3 month auctions. BIS central bankers’ speeches  11    The January and February auctions were uncovered – that is, the amount bid (against either collateral set) was less than the amount on offer. There are two points to note about uncovered auctions. First, even if there is insufficient demand, the auction mechanism functions. Second, irrespective of the cover ratio, the allocation depends on where the bids are relative to the RSS. So while an uncovered auction will mean that the Bank allocates less than it had offered, a similar outcome could still occur if the auction was covered (but the bids were below the RSS). Concluding remarks During the past five years, the Bank has totally re-shaped its operations. Many of the changes arose as a direct consequence of the financial crisis, and the new demands for liquidity insurance that it engendered. As a result, the Bank has now installed permanent  12  BIS central bankers’ speeches  facilities to provide liquidity insurance, without compromising its ability to meet its monetary policy implementation objective. The academic profession can make a significant contribution to the field of central bank operations.

Inflation expectations are a decisive factor for credibility My view is that the decisive factor for a central bank with an inflation target is inflation expectations. Expectations should be anchored around the inflation target in the long run. I say “long run”, as inflation expectations in the short term vary considerably in accordance with actual inflation. Figure 4 shows inflation expectations 1, 2 and 5 years ahead according to Prospera’s survey for money market participants. We can see that inflation expectations 5 years ahead have been around 2 per cent during the past 10 years. I interpret this to mean that there is still unshaken confidence in the inflation target. Figure 4 Money market participants’ inflation expectations according to Prospera Per cent  Note. Monthly data from September 2009. Quarterly data prior to this. Source: TNS SIFO Prospera. BIS Review 85/2010  7  I have so far discussed our experiences of publishing repo rate paths. Let me now go on to discuss the most recent repo rate path in the Monetary Policy Update published in April this year. Some aspects of the current repo rate path Figure 5 shows the repo rate path from the Monetary Policy Update in April together with market expectations of the repo rate. For the coming year both forward rates and survey expectations were very close to the Riksbank’s forecast. Expectations as expressed in the surveys agree fairly well with the Riksbank’s forecast, even in the longer run.
The considerable strengths of the institutional framework of the Fed - full de jure independence, the depth of technical talent, a committee designed to bring a diversity of independent perspectives to the monetary policy decision making process - have not been strong enough to deliver consistently good monetary policy decisions over time. The constituency for price stability in the United States today seems broad and strong and reasonably bipartisan, but it's been a generation since we've had high inflation and had to face the costs of bringing it down. It seems like a long time since monetary policy has been the subject of major political or popular attention. And the extent of deference the Fed now enjoys - the extent of de facto autonomy - is a relatively recent, surprisingly recent phenomenon, and substantially due to the competence demonstrated by the past two chairmen. Monetary policy has been the beneficiary of a long period of good fortune in the form of smaller and less adverse external shocks, a sustained and very large acceleration in productivity, the disinflationary forces produced by global economic integration, greater flexibility in the U.S. economy and improved financial sector resilience, and the effects of these factors and technological change in reducing macroeconomic volatility. We don't know much about the probabilities surrounding the future path of most of these variables. We face a number of transitions ahead that will have important implications for U.S. monetary policy.

Timothy F Geithner: Perspectives on US monetary policy Remarks by Mr Timothy F Geithner, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, before Princeton University’s Center for Economic Policy Studies, Princeton, NJ, 1 April 2005. *  *  *  I am glad to be here at Princeton's Center for Economic Policy Studies to have this conversation with Alan Blinder and to address some of the key questions regarding monetary policy today. I am particularly pleased to be in front of such a distinguished audience, including colleagues from the Federal Reserve who will be talking about some of the same questions at tomorrow's meeting. I would like to start with a few propositions about the state of U.S. monetary policy and the Fed today. The achievements in inflation outcomes of the past decade or so - low inflation, less volatility in inflation, more moderate long term inflation expectations, and less volatility in those expectations, achievements that are impressive relative to past U.S. experience as well as to the gains of other mature central banks - suggest we are close to the frontier of monetary policy credibility. These gains came alongside a significant reduction in the volatility of U.S. output. And they are impressive in light of the speed and force with which the Fed acted in several instances of systemic financial distress.
The rental market in outlying areas, which now indirectly has a larger weight in the CPI, is thin. Hence, the rental market does not necessarily provide a representative expression of owner-occupants’ housing costs. It is difficult to estimate the cost of owner-occupied housing. The harmonised index of consumer prices for the euro area, which the ECB uses as its measure of inflation, has not included owner-occupied housing so far. Nor do many of the national consumer price indices in the EU include this component. This is clearly not a good solution because housing costs normally account for a large portion of households' total cost of living. Eurostat, the European statistical agency, has therefore initiated a pilot study where they use the net acquisition approach.6 This approach is different from our method in that the treatment of purchasing a house for owner occupation is the same as for all other goods in the consumer price index. Only the household sector’s net acquisition of dwellings is included. In other words, purchases of dwellings bought from other private households are excluded. In addition, expenditures related to major repairs and conversions of a dwelling, and other expenditures such as estate agent fees, indirect taxes and insurance are also included in the acquisition approach. Land is treated as an asset and excluded. If European countries switch to including housing costs estimated using the acquisition approach, it will be natural for Norway to publish a comparable index for consumer prices, cf. figures based on Eurostat’s current method are also presented in Norway.

5 The situation had long required bold institutional reforms to the design of monetary union and we should praise the European Commission for having quickly prepared proposals for a Banking Union in 2012. The banking union must be instrumental in resolving the crisis In my view, the banking union must be instrumental in resolving the crisis and unravelling its legacy. It is the crucial node to secure both financial integration and stability. The reason is clear. In the euro area, about 75% of the real economy’s financing needs still originate from the banking sector. What is more, banks are crucial counterparties in the broader system of financial intermediation. Therefore, the importance of establishing the Single Supervisory Mechanism and creating a level playing field for all banks across Europe cannot be overemphasized. 6 A relevant part of this endeavour is the Comprehensive Assessment of bank´s balancesheets that will precede the beginning of the supervisory tasks by the ECB/SSM. Aiming at completing the balance-sheet repair of the banks subject to the SSM it will improve their capital and solvency position. In spite of the recent credit negative behaviour being mostly the result of lack of demand, the enhanced robustness of banks will overcome remaining credit supply restrictions that could hamper the recovery. This process of repairing the banking system is only one part of the challenge policymakers face in Europe. The other, more fundamental part is to build a safer and more resilient financial sector that serves the real economy.
The ECB had to deal with this issue, for example, in the context of the first two longer-term refinancing operations announced in December 2011. When some bankers raised concerns that there might be stigma attached to the ECB’s programme, we said that the decision to accept long-term loans from the ECB should have been seen as a rational business decision and not as a sign of bank distress. 4 The importance of clearly identifying the nature of the frictions leading to the market failures before designing the intervention is also emphasised in another contribution by Thomas Philippon. In his 2013 paper in the Journal of Finance written with Philipp Schnabl, he characterises the optimal intervention in a financial industry plagued by the debt overhang problem. 5 When banks are financed with too much debt, they forgo productive investments, i.e. lending, because in the event of bankruptcy the debt holders would appropriate most of the cash flows. Thomas Philippon and his co-author show that in this case the optimal intervention consists of capital injections against preferred stock (plus warrants) and it is conditional on sufficient bank participation. This design makes it possible to restore the efficient level of lending by providing capital to banks, and at the same time minimises the cost of intervention by controlling for the potential opportunistic behaviours of banks. In particular, the authors highlight two types of opportunistic behaviours induced by the intervention.

To day I would like to reflect on that complexity and its consequences, drawing extensively on a recent illuminating paper by Andrew Haldane from the Bank of England as well as on previous work published by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Complexity comes in two forms. First, it appears in financial instruments themselves, as financial innovation has led, in recent years to a proliferation of so called structured – and, indeed, very complex – products. Second, complexity shows up in the structure of the financial systems, which are based on interdependence between multiple actors and counterparties. Transmissions of shocks occur through networks whose structure and architecture is constantly transformed by financial innovation and regulatory arbitrage. This potentially creates numerous feedback loops and amplification effects. Looking more specifically at the last decade, this increase in complexity had four main features and consequences: •  As techniques for managing and allocating risk became more sophisticated, the network of counterparties expanded in scale and in complexity. This was, truly, a systemic change that was properly understood but not fully captured by regulators at the time. Credit and market risk was supposedly more broadly spread. But counterparty risk increased. Overall, the overall impact on financial stability may well have been negative. •  Complexity led to loss of information, a point underlined by Gorton. Through the chain of tranching and distributing the risk, fundamental values and risk profiles of underlying assets became impossible to reconstruct, even for the most informed investors. There may be a deep paradox here.
The crisis management measures taken by the central banks of the euro area in recent years have been successful, but they have come at a price. Both the balance sheets of the central banks and the associated risks have increased many times over in consequence. However, the ratio of Eesti Pank’s increased equity to the assets used for monetary policy remains one of the lowest of any of the central banks of the euro area. The comparison with the other central banks of the euro area is important, as the balance of risks to capital of the central banks of the euro area as a whole is considered when joint monetary policy decisions are made. This makes it very important that the Supervisory Board of Eesti Pank decided to transfer three quarters of the 17 million euros that the bank made in profit last year to strengthening the capital of Eesti Pank. One quarter of last year’s profit, or 4.3 million euros went to the state budget, and since 1992 Eesti Pank has allocated a total of 133 million euros to the state budget. It may be asked what exactly the central bank’s reserves are for, given that the Riigikogu bears the responsibility of last resort for capitalising Eesti Pank? History has shown that central banks fall into difficulties at times when there is a general economic or financial crisis.

•  Financing new investment through state bonds could well prove inefficient and harmful for the Estonian economy as a whole, even if the investments are in good projects. The low unemployment and rapid wage rises that we see at the moment  2  BIS central bankers’ speeches  would cause a large part of the extra money gained from the emission of state bonds to be lost, as infrastructure projects would cost much more than before. Large state construction projects that can only be temporary in nature would also cause economic and social problems in Estonia, because once the large projects finish, a great number of those working on them would find themselves unemployed, having left jobs in other sectors. •  It must be understood that Estonia already profits from the purchases of bonds by the central banks of the euro area. Financial markets act as a series of communicating vessels, so that when interest rates in one area fall, the effect is passed on to other areas. The lower interest rates in the euro area mean that Estonian companies and households can borrow more cheaply, and were it necessary the Estonian state could also borrow more cheaply. If easier financing conditions spur on the European economy, Estonian exporters will be among the winners, and this is the goal towards which the bond purchase programme is striving.
Mario Draghi: European Systemic Risk Board (welcome address) Speech by Mr Mario Draghi, President of the European Central Bank and Chair of the European Systemic Risk Board, at the first annual conference of the ESRB, Frankfurt am Main, 22 September 2016. * * * Ladies and gentlemen, It is my pleasure to welcome you to the first annual conference of the European Systemic Risk Board (ESRB). We have a rich agenda today and tomorrow – one which reflects the value of the ESRB as an institution. The Board brings policymakers together. We have 80 member institutions, each expert in their own field. This diversity of expertise is our strength. The ESRB is uniquely placed to take a holistic view of the European financial system – to see the overarching risks and challenges that would be more difficult for our members to perceive individually. Sharing knowledge and expertise also permits effective coordination of policy. The ESRB acts as an information hub for the implementation of macroprudential policies for banks, and as a forum to discuss these policies, including their cross-border impact and the possible need to reciprocate them in other jurisdictions. Given its unique Union-wide, cross-sectoral perspective, the ESRB has focused its research on the challenges posed by the structure of the European financial system, and the risks and opportunities arising from ongoing changes to that structure. In that context, let me highlight two themes: the extent of overbanking in Europe and the growth of the non-bank sector.

Although Zambia did not experience bank failures during the current global crisis, work on the establishment of the deposit protection scheme is currently in progress. Quick bank resolution is also an essential element that inspires confidence in the financial system. In Zambia, for instance, work on liquidations has been going on for some time in some cases. The establishment of an effective depositor protection scheme should assist in early bank resolutions while providing protection to the most vulnerable depositors. Chairperson, although the Bank of Zambia has exercised the function of lender of last resort (LOLR) in the past during the banking crisis in the 1990s, there was no clear LOLR policy framework in place. There has been renewed concern that the economic slowdown, if prolonged, could create liquidity pressures in the banking system in Zambia. Past  BIS Review 63/2010  3  experiences and current global slowdown build a strong case for a clearly designed LOLR framework in which the central bank can exercise this function. The challenge in the regulatory and supervisory arrangements is that of operationalising the lender of last resort. Lender of last resort should be seen in light of its role in promoting wider public good and systemic financial stability and ultimately, the wider economic stability. It plays an important role in the economy to avoid the social cost of a bank failure. Some bank failures may lead to contagion effect on other banks which has the potential to transmit to the entire economy.