samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
For example, a body whose members are appointed by the King would not be “independent” of the King (or the ministry).” Source: “The constitutional power to delegate decision-making authority to “independent” bodies”. Appendix 5 to NOU [Official Norwegian Report] 1997:19: Better privacy protection. 42  We can refer to Norges Bank’s reputation survey. In an otherwise positive report, some respondents were of the view that Norges Bank is closed and somewhat unresponsive. See Press release 24 June 2010. 43  See Section 3 of the Norges Bank Act. BIS Review 154/2010  13  Financial stability A challenge for the central bank is that there is a gap between the instruments at the Bank’s disposal in the area of financial stability and the existing expectations that the Bank can ensure the stability of the financial system. If liquidity dries up among banks in Norway or abroad, they are certain to turn to the central bank. The central bank acts as lender of last resort, as it can always supply liquidity in Norwegian kroner. Moreover, the central bank holds foreign exchange reserves that can be made available to the banks in critical situations. But we have no formal competence with regard to financial market regulation and prevention. What we can do is offer advice concerning regulation and set terms for banks’ loans from the central bank.

Uncertainty led to capital flight to countries with substantial gold reserves, such as the US. Countries with small reserves had to maintain a high interest rate to prevent substantial gold outflows. In September 1931, the UK decided to abandon the gold standard. Denmark, Sweden and Norway brought gold redemption to a halt in the same month. Norges Bank was put to a severe test in the interwar period. Nicolai Rygg’s lot was to resolve the problems left by the policy conducted during and just after the war. His approach was on a par with international practice at the time. 18 Although he had his critics, not all the criticism levelled against him would necessarily be regarded as equally well founded today. The general view of Rygg has become more balanced. 19 But the perception of Rygg and Norges Bank in the interwar years, that subsequently became ingrained, had an impact on the tasks that were later assigned to the central bank. The pendulum swung towards less independence for Norges Bank, since the Bank was held responsible for the recession. This impression prevailed for such a long time that it also came to influence the current Norges Bank Act.
The baseline scenario has been revised upwards from $ to $ a barrel; the high oil price scenario has been revised downwards from $ to $ Our oil price forecast for 2020–2021 remains unchanged. These adjustments have made no major impact on expected economic growth indicators in the context of the operating fiscal rule. Finalised data suggest GDP growth was 2.3% last year, above our expectations. Our estimates suggest that the accomplishment of major investment projects emerged as key enablers of this growth. With due regard for this, we, first, reconfirm our assessment of the nature of economic growth: the economy is close to its potential; its expansion does not create additional proinflationary pressure. Second, we keep our GDP growth estimate in the baseline scenario at 1.2-1.7% for this year. The growth rates will accelerate to 1.8-2.3% in 2020 and 2-3% in 2021 as the positive effect of national projects and structural reforms provided that these deliver. The oil price adjustments in the forecast carry implications for balance of payments indicators. In the baseline scenario, the forecast current account balance for this year has been upgraded from $ billion to $ billion, chiefly on the back of a higher value of oil and gas exports. The balance of the financial account of the private sector has also been raised from with $ billion to $ billion. This is based on the actual data for the first two months of the year along with greater opportunities for the buildup of foreign assets given the higher export revenues.

But those that have come further along the liberalization road have to face a different music. 4  From the new External Wealth of Nations Mark II (EWN II) dataset, compiled by Lane and Milesi-Ferretti (2006). 5  Ibid. BIS Review 99/2007  3  Rapid appreciation in the exchange value of the currency renders part of the domestic industries less competitive in the global markets. It is true that with this appreciation, commodity imports such as fuel and energy as well as metal and raw materials have become more affordable despite rising world price trends. But these benefits are spread-out while the cost is centered on labor-intensive, high domestic-content primary sectors, such as agriculture and low-end manufacturing. As a result, even for net primary commodity importing economies, the nature of the problem is as much political economy as it is economic. There are strong and vocal constituencies in emerging markets that are averse to currency appreciation and part of them averse to variability in the exchange rate itself. Meanwhile, hot money, or indeed large inflows in general, can fuel asset prices and encourage excessive risk-taking behavior. Central banks may wish to counter that excess in the interest of financial stability. If the central bank chooses to maintain a high interest rate stance, the pressure on the currency to appreciate will likely mount. Not unlike today’s political economy in advanced countries, emerging market politics also risks being less favorable to openness, but more partial to protection of selected industries or protectionism in general.
Similarly, many euro-sceptics characterize the euro as a pure “political” or geopolitical, project – clearly implying that it has no economic rationale. It will come as no surprise to you that I do not share this view. Obviously, the creation of the euro has been underpinned by a broad political vision and ambition. But there was – and still is – a strong economic rationale in solidifying economic and financial integration in Western Europe by the creation of a single currency. This economic rationale is clearly perceived by investors and market participants who have made the euro the second world currency for investing in financial assets and holding foreign exchange reserves. This being said, history has also shown that the geography of the international monetary system may undergo fast and abrupt changes. Over decades and centuries, new currencies emerge and existing ones disappear as major vehicles for international trade and investment. Geopolitical changes may trigger such evolutions. But some endogenous dynamics are also at work. Past some stages, or “tipping points”, the use of a currency may expand or shrink quickly due to network and scale effects: the more people use a currency, the more attractive it becomes. This begs the question of possible “spheres of influence” appearing in the future with significant evolutions in the respective role and weight of existing currencies. In my remarks, I will simply define such “spheres of influence” as parts of the world economic system where the use of a specific currency might dominate.

A new central bank by the name of Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas or BSP was set up under the patronage of the World Bank and the Export-Import Bank of Japan 8 . Arrangements were made to repay the liabilities of the old central bank in 25 years 9 . The issue at hand is how the oncoming signs of insolvency of CBP were not noticed by its auditors. The growing distress of CBP due to the wrong policy of defending the exchange rate at the expense of losing foreign reserves, accumulation of losses in CBP, rising foreign borrowings through unsustainable swaps and the depletion of net-worth of CBP were obvious to the auditors as early as 1985. It was simply the sad story of one mistake leading to another mistake and that mistake leading to a further mistake and so on. Once a policy making body gets entangled in an “enmeshed policy paradox” of this nature, it is impossible to escape the paradox without outside support. Had the first mistake, that is, defending the exchange rate at the cost of losing the reserves, were not committed, CBP would not have driven itself to insolvency. But, the auditors who were confined only to a compliance audit did not read the signs of impending risk build-up in CBP. Had the central bank management and the legislators been alerted at that time, CBP could have been saved from liquidation.
Reinhart and Rogoff document the substantially detrimental effects that financial crises typically impose on the subsequent economic recovery. As we all know, the recent recession was accompanied by a large financial crisis. When I look at the U.S. economy today, I see it tracking Reinhart and Rogoff’s observation that such recoveries are usually painfully slow – and are so for reasons that have little to do with structural impediments in the labor market and the like. Liquidity traps are rare and difficult events to manage. They present a clear and present danger that we risk repeating the experience of the U.S. in the 1930s or that of Japan over  1  See Christiano, Eichenmbaum and Evans (2005), Smets and Wouters (2007) and Chung et al. (2010). 2  Federal Open Market Committee (2011). 3  Reinhart and Rogoff (2009). BIS central bankers’ speeches  3  the past 20 years. However, liquidity traps have been studied over the years in rigorous analytical models by a number of prominent economists, including Paul Krugman, Gauti Eggertsson, Michael Woodford and Ivan Werning.4 Variants of these models have successfully explained business cycle developments in the United States. The lesson drawn from this literature is that the performance of economies stuck in a liquidity trap can be vastly improved by lowering real interest rates and lifting economic activity using an appropriately prolonged and forward-looking period of accommodative monetary policy. Of course, such monetary accommodation is the antithesis of the policy prescription for the structural impediments scenario.

Rogoff, Kenneth S., 2011, “The Bullets Yet to Be Fired to Stop the Crisis”, Financial Times, August 8, available by subscription. BIS central bankers’ speeches  5  Smets, Frank, and Rafael Wouters, 2007, “Shocks and Frictions in U.S. Business Cycles: A Bayesian DSGE Approach”, American Economic Review, Vol. 97, No. 3, June, pp. 586–606. Werning, Ivan, 2011, “Managing a Liquidity Trap: Monetary and Fiscal Policy”, National Bureau of Economic Research, working paper, No. 17344, August. 6  BIS central bankers’ speeches
Wage share is wages and salaries as a share of GDP. Special contributions capture one-off payments by firms which we have assumed represent one-off back payments to fill pension deficits. Chart 13: Typical wage growth of ‘stickers’ and ‘twisters’ Median annual growth (%)  12  "Twister" 10 8 6  "Sticker" 4 2  1994  1996  1998  2000  2002  2004  2006  2008  2010  2012  2014  2016  0 2018  Sources: ONS and Bank calculations, Note: “Twister” line shown includes job moves within firms, but results are near identical if only job moves between firms were shown. 24  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches  24  Chart 14: Voluntary job-to-job flow rate Percent of those employed in previous period 2.0%  1.5%  1.0%  0.5%  0.0% 2002  2004  2006  2008  2010  2012  2014  2016  2018  Source: ONS and Bank calculations. Notes: Dashed line shows average over time period in chart. Chart 15: Two empirical Philips curves – “stickers” and “twisters” “Sticker”  “Twister”  25  30  25  Wage grwoth (%)  Wage grwoth (%)  20  15  10  5  20  15  10  5  0  0 0  5  10  15  0  Unemployment (%)  5  10  15  Unemployment (%)  Sources: ONS and Bank calculations.

I will start with the financial markets and international developments, before turning to economic developments and monetary policy in Sweden, with particular attention paid to the development of prices and wages. The functioning of the financial markets continues to improve, but they have not recovered completely The functioning of the financial markets is continuing to improve, both in Sweden and abroad. One sign of this is that various risk premia in the money and credit markets continued to decrease during the second half of 2009. The levels of a number of risk premia now seem to have stabilised within a historically normal interval. Possibilities for various market participants to acquire funding at longer durations through the securities market have improved. Moreover, the Riksbank’s risk survey shows that access to funding without government support has increased. The developments on the financial markets can be illustrated by the so-called TED spread, the difference between the three-month interbank rate and treasury bill rates (Figure 1). However, despite this, the situation has still not completely normalised. There are still markets that have not recovered. There also exists some uncertainty regarding the extent of as-yet unrealised loan losses, particularly in European banks, leading to negative consequences for confidence among financial market agents. Furthermore, it must also be expected that bank lending in the United States and a number of other countries will be restrained for some time to come.
These measures were efficient, at least to some extent. Although sometimes circumvented by banks, they have managed to slow down forex credit growth, providing a wise solution to the problems faced at that time by our economy. Back then, we referred to them as unorthodox monetary policy measures, but after the crisis, the IMF mentioned the National Bank of Romania as being among “the pioneers” of what later became “macroprudential instruments”. After the EU entry, the actual membership in this “convergence club” has fueled and enhanced 3/5  BIS central bankers' speeches  the catching-up process. Being in the EU meant free exchange of goods and services, along with the free movement of capital and labor, which increased trade, foreign direct investment, and migration flows, for the benefit of economic growth in our country. Moreover, in the long run, EU membership fostered convergence through investments from European funds. Romania has certainly come a long way in terms of economic convergence, with growth resuming and gaining momentum after the global economic crisis: its GDP per capita as a share in the EU average (based on PPS) more than doubled from 30.6 percent in 2003 to 62.7 percent in 2017. The advance was the fastest within the group of peer countries that recorded similar trends: for instance, Bulgaria went from 32.4 to 49.3 percent, while Hungary, the Czech Republic and Poland, which started from a more advanced level, added between 7 and 22 percentage points to the same indicator during 2003–2017.

Mugur Isărescu: 15th Anniversary of the 2004 EU Enlargement looking back, looking forward Opening speech by Mr Mugur Isărescu, Governor of the National Bank of Romania, at the conference on the 15th Anniversary of the 2004 EU Enlargement: Looking back, looking forward, National Bank of the Republic of Austria, Vienna, 8 April 2019. * * * Governor Nowotny, Distinguished audience, Ladies and gentlemen, I am greatly honoured by the invitation to address this audience at a time when we celebrate the 15th anniversary of the first wave of EU enlargement. This event gives me yet another opportunity to say a few words about Romania, a country that I know very well. Romania was a second wave country, the same as Bulgaria, but I am familiar with the case of the first wave countries because I watched their course of development and I must say they paved our way to EU membership. I will look back at Romania’s journey on the path of European integration, while also reminiscing the entire transition from communism to democracy and from a centralised economy to a market economy. I believe discussing this subject is useful, since the lessons and challenges of the past have been quite numerous and some of Romania’s peculiarities might be relevant for other countries.
Cribb, J, Emmerson, C and Tetlow, G (2014), “Incentives, shocks or signals: labour supply effects of increasing the female state pension age in the UK”, IFS Working Paper No. 13/03. 11  For example, out-of-work lone parents with older children must now claim Job Seekers Allowance, a benefit with job search conditions attached, unlike previous Income Support. Consistent with these changes, Blundell et al (2014) find that participation and employment rates appear to have increased strongly (by 8–9%) among lone mothers who were affected by the 2010 changes. Blundell, R, Crawford, C and Jin, W (2014), “What can wages and employment tell us about the UK’s productivity puzzle?”, The Economic Journal, 124 (May). See also Avram, S, Brewer, M and Salvatori, A (2013), “Lone parent obligations: an impact assessment”, Department of Work and Pensions Research Report No. 845. 12  Blundell et al (2014) examine the effects of the peak-to-trough wealth shocks implied by the financial crisis on older workers’ labour supply. They focus on individuals aged 55–74, and examine whether changes in wealth help to predict future employment patterns in 2010–11 given employment status in 2006–7. They find evidence that shocks to housing wealth helped to predict employment status. For example, compared to the least affected 20% of men, the worst affected 20% of men were 14% more likely to be in work in 2010–1. The authors caution against taking too strong an interpretation of their results, however.

However, that seigniorage is dispersed among all the assets of the Central Bank and cannot be identified for the purpose of paying out to the government. Instead, what is explicitly recorded in the books of accounts is the interest income which the Bank earns on the assets it has created. All costs of the Bank are charged to this interest income and the net surplus is ascertained. That surplus is not automatically paid to the government, since Exter has made specific provisions regarding the appropriation of the profits of the Bank. In terms of these provisions, there is an order of priority for the appropriation of profits of the Bank. First, profits should be applied to pay any outstanding amount carried to a Monetary Adjustment Account on account of (a) extraordinary currency issue (b) expenses and interest payments on the issue of Bank’s own securities and (c) any interest paid on commercial bank reserves in that unlikely event of the Bank’s raising the statutory reserve ratio to 100 percent to fight a very high inflationary situation. Second, anything remaining after the first appropriation, a reserve should be created to a value of at least 15 percent of the domestic assets of the Bank. 6  BIS Review 92/2007  Third, if any profits are left out after the above two appropriations, the remaining profits can be paid to the government. In terms of the above provisions, the payment of profits to the government is the third and last priority on the scale.
At the same time, we signalled that there would probably be a need to increase the rate later in the year. Growth in the world economy and in the Swedish economy is robust and our assessment is therefore that inflation will increase gradually towards the 2 per cent target, reaching it a couple of years from now (see Figures 1 and 2). However, this development assumes that the repo rate will be increased, as otherwise inflation will exceed the target. Current monetary policy Despite the fact that inflation has been clearly below target for some time, the Riksbank increased its key rate twice during the winter, by a total of 0.5 percentage points. Perhaps some people may wonder if this was really necessary; we are still in a situation with high unemployment and we cannot as yet see any inflationary pressures stemming from wages – one of the most important factors behind rising costs/prices in the economy. However, it is not today’s inflation that determines whether we shall increase or decrease the interest rate; it is the future inflation rate. The Riksbank’s forecasts and decisions refer in particular to inflation  BIS Review 43/2006  1  a couple of years ahead. We assume that it will take roughly this long before interest rate changes have a full impact on demand and thus on inflation. The Riksbank does not wish to achieve an inflation rate of 2 per cent at all costs. This is neither possible nor desirable.

The industry experienced a compound average growth rate of 27 percent in terms of net contributions between 2005–2010, with family takaful driving the growth at 28 percent for the same period, to dominate more than 80 percent of the total takaful market in 2010. The strong growth momentum is expected to continue, underpinned by the rising affluence of Malaysian amidst strong economic fundamentals. Given the large untapped market that still exists with only 54 percent of the population having a life insurance or family takaful policy, the takaful industry is poised to benefit in the years ahead. Today’s launch is thus an important step in our overall strategy to further elevate the growth and development of the takaful industry. ING Public Takaful Ehsan is the 3rd licensee to launch out of the 4 family takaful licences awarded recently, making up to a total of 11 takaful players now operating in Malaysia. The initiative for strengthening competition in takaful industry is premised on our quest to unlock the enormous growth potential that lie ahead. There are 3 dimensions from which strong opportunities for growth can be harnessed in the takaful industry. First, is the opportunity to penetrate the remaining underserved areas in family takaful. One such area is medical and health, which in 2010 constitutes only 9 percent of new family takaful business.