samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
Unfortunately, it has to be admitted that food and energy prices affect the cost of the consumer basket more than in older euro area Member States. Thus, consumer prices accelerated to 5% in Estonia. 3. Estonia stands strong, compared to the EU average. In the midst of a crisis, we demonstrated our ability to quickly fix the balance in times of trouble. We now need to make plans for regulating our behaviour at times of joy. 4. Our State Budget Strategy has set out a budget policy framework for the medium perspective. Unfortunately, we have yet to see the binding nature of the document in the decision-making process. For example, the budget strategy prepared in the spring of 2011 set its sights on restoring the consolidated budget surplus. As at 2012, the attainment of the objective has been postponed. This is worrying. It shows that the current framework enables to change long-term goals too easily. The current framework also provides no solutions to managing the cost increase at times of growth. It would thus be reasonable to establish rules for restricting expenditure alongside the established rules for ensuring a balance. These rules would reduce the volatility of the cost increase, prevent unjustified expectations and alleviate the pains of cost-cutting. 5. At the beginning of 2012, the euro area heads of state and government resolved to launch the European Stability Mechanism sooner than initially planned. 6.

Companies were cautiously optimistic in the first half of the year, but summer saw a postponement of investment and recruitment decisions. Confidence loss slowed economic growth, easing inflationary pressures. In November and December, we thus lowered the interest rates to an all-time low. 3. Under normal circumstances, changing interest rates alone would have sufficed to influence prices and economic activity. Unfortunately, the crisis proved extensive  BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  enough to disrupt the functioning of the monetary policy transmission mechanism. The ability of commercial banks to issue loans to companies and households was thus significantly reduced. This compelled us to take various non-standard measures, starting from August. We supported the securities market in order to prevent paralysation of the activities of banks; we continued the unlimited provision of liquidity loans to banks; we offered banks three-year loans on highly favourable conditions; we expanded the list of eligible collaterals for liquidity loans, and lowered the minimum reserve requirement from 2% to 1% at the end of the year. 4. Looking back, it has to be admitted that the annual growth in consumer prices was faster than expected, amounting to 2.7%. Inflation picked up mostly due to the price growth of commodities. This is confirmed by core inflation remaining below 1.5%. Inflation expectations are also in line with our long-term goal. [THE PRICE OF CRISIS-TIME MONETARY POLICY FOR CENTRAL BANKS] 1. These bold and crucial steps came with a price – the risks inherent in the central banks’ balance sheets have increased.
the Council of national Governments which is the equivalent in Europe of a federal government in a political federation. - Secondly, one should not underestimate the degree of monetary stability already achieved by European countries. Monetary stability is not only a project for the future, it is already a major achievement in many European countries. For example, seven countries have been participating in the ERM without any change in their central parities for more than ten years. - Thirdly, it is a false perception to view the necessary fiscal consolidation and monetary stability as constraints imposed by the Maastricht Treaty against the very interests of European countries. We would be implementing the same economic policies if there were no Maastricht Treaty, since they are based on some principles of sound economic management which are necessary to create jobs and tackle the problem of unemployment. Finally, economic and monetary union and the creation of the euro will crown economic and monetary cooperation between European countries, notably France and Germany which are the two pillars of it, and will foster prosperity, stability and peace in the European Union. BIS Review 63/1997

A major reason for this is the debt brake, which is extremely important for monetary policy and contributes to safeguarding an independent monetary policy. By pursuing a monetary and fiscal policy oriented towards stability, the negative impact of the crisis on the Swiss economy could be mitigated. As the events of the last two years have brought into focus, the monetary policy of a small open economy must also be able to rely on healthy fiscal policies in other countries. The debt crisis and the way the markets perceived it have considerably impaired the conduct of monetary policy in Switzerland. To fulfil its mandate, the Swiss National Bank has had to take far-reaching measures, such as setting a minimum exchange rate against the euro. BIS central bankers’ speeches  1
We also have a seat at the table in Basel with respect to the activities of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), its various committees, and the Financial Stability Board (FSB). As I noted earlier, economics is a critical discipline at the New York Fed. The New York Fed economists are not just theoreticians. Most have a strong empirical orientation and work very  1  Eric Rosengren, President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston; Charles Plosser, President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia; and Narayana Kocherlakota, President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  closely with those in the Bank that are responsible for the execution of policy – be it with respect to monetary policy, financial stability, supervision or payments services. What’s special to me about the Bank is how the economists and non-economists work together to develop practical policy solutions to real-world problems and then implement those policies effectively. The breadth of activities at the New York Fed means that our economists contribute to policy in many different ways, working closely with other areas of the Bank including those who execute on our supervision, monetary policy, and payments responsibilities. We have about 60 Ph.D. economists in our Research Group. But we also have many more in other areas of the Bank, such as part of our open markets desk, in our supervision group, and in our risk functions.

  Longer-term work to assess what monetary policy framework is most consistent with the goals of monetary policy and financial stability. New York Fed economists have made many contributions to the theory and measurement in New Keynesian models, focusing on monetary policy at the zero lower bound, and incorporating financial frictions into more standard macro models. 2  Dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE). BIS central bankers’ speeches  3  Microeconomic and regional policy New York Fed economists also have important opportunities supporting microeconomic and regional policy. These include the survey of consumer expectations, which will launch this month, and the consumer credit panel, which, using raw data supplied by Equifax, allows us to develop insights into consumer indebtedness at the micro-level. These panels give us and the public unique insights into household beliefs and behavior. One example is the work highlighting the growing aggregate student loan debt balance and repayment burden. An important responsibility for each of the Reserve Banks is coverage of economic development in its region. A significant aspect of this work at the New York Fed involves our regional press briefings, business surveys, and white papers. One notable example has been the New York Fed economists’ work in developing a white paper that highlighted some key choices that Puerto Rican policymakers might make to eliminate structural constraints that have impinged on the Island’s economic performance. I’m very pleased by the contributions of our economists in the Bank, whether they sit in the Research Group or elsewhere in the Bank.
In the coming years, and we  BIS Review 46/2003  5  can start very soon, we look forward to continuing this dialogue with banks, banking associations, and researchers to find ways to move Basel in the direction of full credit risk models. Consistency of Accounting Standards and the New Basel Accord A second area, where work has started and will continue, is the need to align the regulatory framework more closely with the converging standards in accounting worldwide. Many industry representatives have noted quite correctly that a greater “meeting of the minds” is warranted especially now that the New Basel Accord includes explicit disclosure requirements intended to promote greater insight into a bank’s risk profile. Likewise, the Basel Committee’s treatment of provisions and the valuation of financial instruments must keep pace with changes in the relevant accounting standards. The members of the Committee believe that market discipline, and hence financial stability, is strengthened when accounting and disclosure requirements reflect sound risk management principles and are consistent with the control practices that banks adopt. Consequently, we recognise our responsibility to participate actively in the development of national and international accounting standards. Where the development of international standards is concerned, the Committee and its member organisations devote considerable resources and staff time to sharing our perspectives as supervisors with those who make the rules. But the discussions between supervisors and accountants cannot be a one-way street.

Effective fiscal measures are necessary in order to prevent monetary policy from bearing the brunt of these pressures, since this would have an excessive impact on the traded goods sector. The firmer the fiscal stance is at the peak of construction activity, the smaller is the increase in the real exchange rate that will inevitably will accompany it, with a correspondingly beneficial effect on current export and most competing industries. Ladies and Gentlemen The global economy is shrouded in uncertainty. A low rate of growth has been attained in most industrialised countries since 2001 and the recovery is slower than had been hoped. The war in Iraq heightens this uncertainty. Favourable economic conditions among main trading partner countries is important for Iceland’s terms of trade. A special cause for concern is therefore the deteriorating outlook in the euro region, which is important for Iceland’s foreign trade. The situation in Iceland is quite different. A prolonged growth phase was followed by one year, 2002, of a minor contraction, but at present we foresee a new period of growth when our task will be to maintain economic balance. Expectations of greater prosperity are already clearly visible. I would like to conclude by thanking the Office of the Prime Minister and other government authorities for their pleasant cooperation. I also thank the financial institutions for their good collaboration. Last but not least, I would like to thank the employees of the Central Bank for their fine work, without which the Bank could not have achieved such impressive results.
I would like to emphasise that undertaking such projects emphasises the mutual engagement of the EU and Albania with regard to deepening integration processes of our country, and reiterates Albania’s European perspective. Dear ladies and gentlemen, In the last decade, Bank of Albania has implemented a number of EU-funded projects. The first twinning project was implemented during 2012 – 2013. At that time, like now, Banca d’Italia – in partnership with Banque de France – contributed successfully to achieving concrete results in six areas of Bank of Albania’s activity. The second project – needs analysis for Bank of Albania’s approximation, funded by the EU – was led by the European Central Bank and was implemented during 2014. The aim of the sixmonth project was to assess the legal, regulatory and operational frameworks of the Bank of Albania vis-à-vis standards and best practices applied in European central banks. From this perspective, it should be underlined that the recommendations left upon the completion of this project are incorporated in the list of main priorities for Bank of Albania’s institutional approximation to the model applied in the European System of Central Banks. In addition, in light of addressing these priorities, the European Commission decided to allocate EUR 800 000 as under IPA 2015. After a long process of consultations and sharing information, for the first time, Bank of Albania’s experts put together a Twinning Project, which was submitted to the European Union Delegation to Albania.

I understand LumenLab already has an existing relationship with NUS, and aims to seek more partnerships across industry sectors such as data analytics, market research, pharmaceutical, and technology, to explore new business opportunities. LumenLab is a prime example of how a large enterprise can create an environment like this within its  4  The LTA and A*STAR has been working on the Singapore Autonomous Vehicle Initiative (SAVI) since August 2014, and has successfully rolled out Autonomous Vehicle (AV) trials in One-North in March 2015. 5  Telemedicine is the use of telecommunications and IT to provide remote clinical healthcare. 6  Oscar Health is a New York-based start-up that provides policy holders with telemedicine tools, enables drug and doctor searches, price comparison for healthcare services, and rewards policy holders for hitting activity goals. Obamacare start-up Oscar Health hits a $ billion valuation, Forbes (2015). 2  BIS central bankers’ speeches  structure, to foster a culture of innovation and entrepreneurship, and partner with organisations across industry sectors and academia in Singapore to identify opportunities for innovation and growth. Singapore as a smart financial centre Singapore, too, needs to position ourselves for this new future.
With regard to institutions and groups, which have not been classified as significant and do not operate cross border, the national resolution authorities exercise fully their powers for resolution planning, assessing resolvability and the possibility to address the impediments to a resolution, as well as the resolution actions. At the same time, in order to ensure the effective and consistent implementation of the resolution framework, the SRB issues guidance and general instructions to the national resolution authorities regarding the performance of the tasks and adoption of resolution decisions. Within the SRB, the national resolution financing mechanisms are replaced by the Single Resolution Fund (SRF), where the credit institutions from the participating Member States make ex-ante, and if needed, ex-post contributions. The decisions about determining the amount of banks’ contributions to the SRF and about the SRF funds management are taken by the SRB. It is the national resolution authorities that are responsible for informing the banks about their calculated individual contributions and for raising and transferring the contributions to the SRF. Using the funds to finance the resolution of failing credit institutions within the Banking Union is an exceptional power conferred to the SRB. The SRB will perform this function with regard to both the banks in Bulgaria which are directly supervised by the ECB and the banks for which the BNB continues to be, even within the SRM, the resolution authority with direct powers.

The second principal-agent problem, between firms and the authorities, is different in kind but similar in consequence. It arises because of a familiar public policy problem – timeconsistency. If the ex-post failure of an institution risks destabilising the system, any ex-ante pre-commitment by the authorities to let it fail will lack credibility. This is simply a variant of the old adage that if you owe the bank a small amount it is your problem, a large amount it is theirs. These days, if a bank owes a small amount it is their problem, a large amount it is the authorities. This time-consistency problem weakens incentives for banks to consider for themselves large-scale risks to their balance sheet which might induce failure. The safety net becomes a comfort blanket, the backstop a balm. And the greater the risk these institutions themselves pose in the event of failure, the weaker the incentives to manage risk. These are topsy-turvy incentives from a public policy perspective, with risk management discipline weakest among those whom society would wish it to be strongest. And the evidence? A few years ago, ahead of the present crisis, the Bank of England and the FSA commenced a series of seminars with financial firms, exploring their stress-testing practices. The first meeting of that group sticks in my mind. We had asked firms to tell us the sorts of stress which they routinely used for their stress-tests.
The buyer of the credit risk (the insurance provider) commits itself to compensating the bank if TeliaSonera does not fulfil its obligations in some way during the contract period. The bank pays a regular premium for this, which is determined when the contract is signed. The definition of failing to fulfil its obligations is made clear in the contract between the bank and the investor. This is what is known in the jargon as a credit event. It could mean, for instance, that TeliaSonera doesn’t pay the interest as agreed, that it defaults on payment of the outstanding debt or that it goes bankrupt. The premium the bank has to pay to the investor reflects the market’s assessment of the risk that such an event will occur. The greater the probability, the higher the premium. Most companies for which credit derivatives are traded also have bond loans issued on the international market for corporate bonds. How much an investor is willing to pay for these bonds depends of course on how he assesses the probability that the company will default on its interest payments or perhaps even go bankrupt – that is to say, that a credit event will occur. 1  A more detailed description of the credit derivatives market is provided in the article “Trading activity in credit derivatives and implications for financial stability” in the Riksbank’s Financial Stability Report 2006:2.

Market participants and products The market for credit derivatives attracts a large number of market participants who have not been active in the credit market earlier. The most important buyers of credit risk are large institutional investors such as insurance companies and pension funds. Hedge funds are also large actors. The main sellers of credit risk are banks and other credit institutions who want to relieve themselves of parts of their credit risk, for instance to meet capital adequacy requirements from authorities or merely to use their capital more efficiently. In practice, the credit derivative market is centred on a few globally-active banks, which function as brokers in the trade. The ten largest counterparties on the market account for a good 85 per cent of the total volumes traded and are represented by large investment banks such as Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and UBS. At the same time as the volumes have increased, the products have developed. The largest growth is currently in the new products, including what is known as index products. Somewhat simplified, a typical index product reflects a portfolio of credit risks in different companies, instead of reflecting the credit risk in a single company 3 . The index products increase the investors’ opportunities to spread their investments in the credit market. In this context, I would also like to mention that there are alternative credit insurance methods that have likewise developed strongly. One of these is traditional syndicated loans.
Cooperative banks also have a significant presence in South Korea, Japan, Canada, Morocco, Mexico and Brazil. So the question immediately arises: how come that no such institution has ever been set up in Malta? After all one would have thought that the idea of cooperation and solidarity, and the spirit of the Seven Basic Principles of the International Cooperative Alliance (ICA) would have a strong appeal in Malta. These seven principles consist of: voluntary and open membership; democratic member control; member economic participation; autonomy and independence; education, training and information of members and employees; cooperation with other cooperatives; and, especially, concern for the community. Moreover, we do have cooperatives in other spheres of activity here, and these have been around for some time. Indeed, the start of the cooperative movement in Malta dates back to the later years of the 19th century (around 1884), and the first form of legislation regulating cooperatives here – the Cooperative Societies Ordinance 1946 – came into effect on 12th December of that year. Initially the movement took root in the agriculture and fisheries sector, which in those times employed a significant part of the population. But later, as Malta developed socially and economically, the movement continued to flourish and to expand, and new cooperatives were set up in practically every sector of the economy. Indeed, there are currently some 60 cooperatives in Malta, with over 5000 members, spread over a wide range of activities.

In the wake of the sub-prime mortgage crisis in the United States, several aspects of Basel II have attracted attention. Among them has been the use of ratings in the regulatory framework and whether this has unintentionally discouraged investors from performing their own due diligence. The underestimation of risk for structured credit securitisations has now come under greater scrutiny. There has also been increased debate over the cyclicality impact of Basel II. The effectiveness of the supervisory review process in ensuring that additional capital buffers are provided by banks for risks not fully captured under Pillar 1 of the framework has also been the subject of this review by authorities. The relative importance of these issues will be different for different countries, depending on the stage of development of the financial markets and the banking system, as well as the supervisory structure that is in place. Among Asia Pacific countries, experiences with the implementation of Basel II have been varied. For emerging economies, Basel II has arguably a more far reaching impact. This is on account of several factors. Firstly, many emerging economies continue to depend heavily on the banking system to finance economic activity. With a few exceptions, commercial banks are the main providers of credit in most emerging economies, accounting for an average of 90% of total credit. This produces a higher correlation to the economic sectors where the implications on the banking system could result in significant disruptions to credit supply which could in turn affect economic activity.