samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
History is important In a study1 published by the LSE’s Financial Markets Group last year, Rosa Maria Lastra concludes that central banks are not “natural products” but products of history. She emphasises the special relationships whereby central banks have been consciously awarded privileges by governments, and have been expected to provide certain services and functions in return. This may seem a dubious process, like selling monopolies. But central banking, she kindly says, is not an “evil”: that comes as a relief to some of us. Though a product of history, and a creature favoured by the state, a central bank may serve useful economic goals in the pursuit of stable money and sound banking. While most of their functions could be fulfilled by a different public or private institution, central banks are today typically seen as convenient instruments for the conduct of both monetary policy and banking supervision. I agree with Dr Lastra’s conclusions. Moreover, central banks’ differing historical origins influence not only the tasks they carry out today, but also the way in which they think and operate. The Bank of England was established to lend money to the government; and though the Maastricht Treaty now prohibits any buying of British government debt by the Bank of England in the primary market, the Bank still manages government funding operations in an essentially agency capacity (and the present Governor first came to public prominence in this area!).

Notably, we have recently agreed in principle to accept preferred interests in two of AIG's large foreign life insurance subsidiaries, AIA and ALICO, in order to make repayment of our loan less dependent on forced divestitures into a depressed acquisition market. Although it will take time, we still expect that the proceeds from asset sales should enable AIG to repay the New York Fed in full. In all that we have done, we have been motivated by two goals: to preserve the stability of the U.S. economy and to protect the U.S. taxpayer. The threat of a major systemic risk event has been averted by honoring all of AIG's contractual obligations around the globe – from insurance policy obligations owed to individuals, municipalities and businesses across the U.S., to the posting of collateral under credit default swap arrangements with the full range of counterparties recently disclosed. As unattractive as certain aspects of this treatment may be, these negative aspects have followed unavoidably from the decision to avert a systemically destructive bankruptcy. I look forward to your questions today and, in the longer term, to working with you and your staffs on the broader public policy questions – such as formulation of a resolution regime for institutions like AIG and consideration of the appropriate supervisory structure for OTC derivatives – that are posed by the events at AIG. Thank you. BIS Review 35/2009  3
The market will require property investors and owners to recognise and adapt to changing requirements from the users, particularly their increasing wish to manage the risks of property occupation more efficiently. It will require a willingness to work in partnership with tenants and to exploit the benefits of technology to the full. Lenders and other property professionals will need to understand and embrace these changes. I know that some of you already recognise this. Some of you are not afraid of the PFI. We have recently had the end of history, the end of politics. Will the end of distance be next? Will “location, location, location” be replaced by “communications, communications, communications”? 24 This environment offers opportunities which you may - or may not - wish to take. Those who take these opportunities will be the survivors and thrivers. I leave you with my old refrain ringing in your ears: transparency; liquidity; intelligent investment; revenue not capital gain; innovation - all the qualities of a deep, high quality market place. BIS Review 11/1997

BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  So if the narrowness of my scope disappoints, I would invite you sit back. Literally. Admire the Sheldonian’s ceiling. Marvel at how Wren’s original design bridged such an expanse with neither beams that could individually span its width nor floor-to-ceiling columns that could support it. Reflect on the allegory in the paintings that shows Truth descending upon the Arts and Sciences, expelling ignorance from the University. While you do, I will attempt my more meagre exam question. The Bank’s very great – yet rightly circumscribed – responsibilities are formalised in the remits of the three major policy-making bodies of the Bank – the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC), the Financial Policy Committee (FPC), and the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA). The MPC’s remit requires it to achieve price stability, formalised as 2% CPI inflation, and subject to that to support the Government’s economic policy including its objectives for growth and employment. The FPC works to remove or reduce systemic risks with a view to protecting and enhancing the resilience of the UK financial system as a whole, and is subject to the same secondary objective as the MPC. And finally, the Bank of England’s PRA is required to promote the safety and soundness of individual firms; to contribute to securing an appropriate degree of protection for insurance policyholders; and, subject to that, to facilitate effective competition.
Since linkages are deep and dense, even the tiniest tensions can be amplified, echoing and reverberating across the world – often in an instant, often with unpredictable twists and turns. Because of this, the global economy can become even more prone to instability”. Therefore, given the complexity and interconnectedness in the current economic activity and the high level of involvement of media in the present day, we must take all steps to avoid the eruption of even a small shock in the financial system as it can create a bigger impact on the economy and on social and political fronts, thereby deteriorating market confidence and increasing overall uncertainty. We believe the consolidation process would avoid, if not, at least minimise such impact. Reason 4: Addressing the fragmentation issue in the financial sector Currently our banking and non-banking sectors are highly fragmented and operate in a skewed manner reflecting the dominance of a few large banks and NBFIs. Continuation of this situation is risky because the small financial institutions are generally more exposed to internal and external shocks and tend to threaten the stability of the entire financial system of the country. Our banking sector constitutes 34 banks, of which 22 are domestic banks and 12 are foreign banks. The assets of the banking sector amount to approximately Rs. 6.3 trillion with only 5 banks, each maintaining an asset base of over Rs. 500 billion, accounting for a share of 66 per cent. Meanwhile 6 medium size banks, including 2 foreign banks, hold assets between Rs.

Step 1: Initiation of financial sector consolidation The Central Bank initiated the planning of the consolidation programme several years ago, and since then, a number of things have been done to bring it into reality, with procedures being carefully articulated for smoother implementation. As a result, in 2013, the Central Bank officially informed the Ministry of Finance, through a Budget Proposal, of the need for a strong and dynamic financial sector, by consolidating the institutions in the banking and nonbanking sectors in a prudent manner to ensure enhanced financial system stability and to spearhead economic growth. To support this initiative, His Excellency the President, in his Budget Speech on 21 November 2013, proposed to grant special tax concessions for expenditure incurred by banks and NBFIs, if they merge with, or acquire one or more financial institutions. Further, in view of providing better financial services for the development activity of the country, His Excellency proposed that two development banks, that is, NDB and DFCC be merged, for which too, qualifying payment status would be granted. Ladies and gentlemen, as the Central Bank is charged with the duty of securing financial system stability by its mandate, the major responsibility of implementing the consolidation programme announced by His Excellency the President was entrusted to the Central Bank. Further, in order to meet the funding requirements for the implementation of the consolidation programme, the Monetary Board approved a budgetary allocation from the Central Bank.
The second was the economic programme developed by the Icelandic authorities in co-operation with the IMF. The programme had three key goals: stabilisation of the exchange rate, fiscal sustainability, and reconstruction of the financial sector. Comprehensive capital controls were an important element in the programme, but their rationale was to help to stabilise the exchange rate in a situation where the currency had fallen more than 50% in 2008, where foreign króna positions that were a legacy of carry trade and capital inflows amounted to around 40% of GDP, and where a large fiscal deficit that had to be financed in the domestic market had developed. The capital controls therefore gave monetary policy more scope to help stabilise and turn around the real economy once inflation came down. Subsequently, they shielded the eocnomy from the financial spillover effects of the crisis in the eurozone. 2  BIS central bankers’ speeches  But the problem is that they are still in place, over five years after the climax of Iceland´s financial crisis. The reason is that Iceland is still facing a balance of payments crisis that is a legacy of former capital inflows and the unwinding of these big cross-border banks.

This story was much more unique, as it involved the first banking crisis in Europe since the EU single market was formed in the early 1990s. Let me briefly discuss each of these in turn, in order to set the stage for the policy discussions. First, the macroeconomic boom-bust story. All the usual suspects were present: very strong capital inflows fuelling a credit and asset price boom that subsequently turned into a bubble at the same time as the economy overheated and an unsustainable external position developed, as could be seen in a double-digit current account deficit. And macroeconomic and prudential policies were not up to the task. At the deepest level, this part of the story was related to three factors: 1. The complications that tend to arise with macroeconomic management as very small, open economies become more and more financially integrated;  2. The specific conditions of ample and cheap credit at the global level;  3. And major policy mistakes in Iceland, both of the type that would be deemed to be such in any book (such as giving an already overheated economy a demand stimulus), and those more closely related to the orthodoxy prevailing at the time: freely floating exchange rates, interest rate policy focusing mainly on low inflation in terms of goods and services, and good micro-supervision; and let the markets do the rest. The first factor is perhaps of interest here.
William Ryback: Launch of two-factor authentication for internet banking in Hong Kong Speech by Mr William Ryback, Deputy Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, at the launch of two-factor authentication for internet banking, Hong Kong, 30 May 2005. *  *  *  Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. A very warm welcome to all of you to today’s press conference, which marks the launch of two-factor authentication by the banking industry in Hong Kong. It is a great pleasure that I am joined this afternoon by Mr He, Chairman of the Hong Kong Association of Banks, and Mr Man, Senior Superintendent, Commercial Crime Bureau, Hong Kong Police Force. They will be sharing with you shortly about the benefits of two-factor authentication to bank customers and its effectiveness in combating Internet banking frauds. We will be happy to answer your questions afterwards. The acceptance of Internet banking services has been growing rapidly in Hong Kong over the past years. At the end of 2004, over 2.7 million personal Internet banking accounts (an increase of 23% from a year ago) and 107,000 business Internet banking accounts (an increase of 60% from a year ago) were established in Hong Kong. To date many of the banking services are available online. In view of the growing acceptance of Internet banking services and sophistication of Internet banking frauds reported locally and overseas, the banking industry in Hong Kong reached a general consensus last year to strengthen the Internet banking security by implementing two-factor authentication.

The first challenge is posed by data. As any statistician knows, the output of a model is only as good as the quality of data fed into it – the so-called “rubbish in, rubbish out” problem. Of course, there are various techniques for dealing with this problem, but fundamentally, if there are problems with the data used – be they incomplete, inaccurate or mislabelled – there will almost certainly be problems with the outcomes of the model. AI/ML is underpinned by the huge expansion in the availability and sources of data: as the amount of data used grows, so the scale of managing this problem will increase. Further, there are complex ethical, legal, conduct and reputational issues associated with the use of personal data. For example, are data being used unfairly to exclude individuals or groups, or to promote unjustifiably privileged access for others? Recent examples amongst retailers suggest that overly-personalised marketing can seem plain ‘creepy’. These questions require complex answers that are beyond my philosophical pay-grade. From a regulatory perspective, they are perhaps more directly a primary concern to the FCA given its statutory objectives of consumer protection, but are also potentially relevant to safety and soundness, not least through their impact on reputation and, in turn, confidence. The data challenge is not limited simply to its selection and processing – but also to its analysis, and how inferences are drawn.
i) TeSA aims to identify specific ICT skills in demand and work with training providers to meet these demands. ii) For example, the US-based Byte Academy has recently set up in Singapore, and has come on board IMDA’s Tech Immersion and Placement Programme (TIPP). Byte will offer a series of intensive courses on FinTech and data science to ‘convert’ nonICT professionals to meet the software and programming needs of the industry. 18 I encourage all companies, both start-ups and incumbents, and individuals, to tap on these initiatives and invest in the skills of the future. 19 We cannot talk about expertise without talking about learning. And learning, unlearning and re-learning is what the game is about in the economy that we are creating together. 20 We need to learn more about the things we do not know, and to constantly update our knowledge in familiar areas. In every job, from the CEOs to the fresh entrant from school. 21 We never know where our learning journey will take us, but it usually takes us somewhere better. Take for example Vernon Heng, 32. After university, he worked overseas in a variety of fields, including construction, sales and marketing and supply chain. 3/4  BIS central bankers' speeches  When he decided to return home to Singapore and explore new career options, his brother, a user experience (UX) designer, encouraged him to consider the field. He enrolled in a UX course at General Assembly under IMDA’s TIP Programme, and found himself enjoying every step of the process.

Further liberalization of financial services, progressing as planned in Financial Sector Master Plan II, will provide Thailand opportunity for firms to have better access to funds at a more competitive price, especially small businesses which comprise a large part of the workforce. This adds another dimension to Thailand’s competitiveness and will help strengthen economic growth. Now, let me turn towards the Bank of Thailand’s other major responsibility – to balance between financial stability and economic growth. The role of monetary policy is to manage the financial environment to ensure macroeconomic and financial stability. The Monetary Policy Committee, or MPC, has maintained an accommodative monetary policy stance throughout the adverse shocks in the last couple of years. In the current episode, we are conducting monetary policy to maintain a right balance between economic growth and financial stability, including inflation. The current policy rate which is negative in real term has already helped alleviate small businesses and households’ interest burden and can help the private sector survive the short term slump. Turnaround is coming! Weak sentiment due to the uncertainty about the political situation is the root cause of the faltering domestic demand. Political resolution is beyond our scope, so it may be appropriate to focus more on the medium and long term strategy necessary to support the economic rebound once the political status improves. The collaboration between private businesses and financial sectors to deal with the mentioned structural challenges is required to lay a solid foundation of the future economy.
It is of the utmost importance that the entire euro area and Europe as a whole maintain and consolidate their cost competitiveness position. Since the introduction of the single currency, it is more important than ever that we closely monitor the production cost indicator, as it determines to a large extent the competitiveness of goods and services produced in our economy and, therefore, the current level of employment. It also acts as a “leading indicator” of future employment because it gives a measure of the attractiveness of an inward investment compared with investment outside the euro area or outside Europe. Embarking in bold structural reforms: In this context, we also need to pursue and step up bold structural reforms, aimed at increasing the flexibility of the economy as a whole and fostering the progress of science and technologies. This is crucial if we wish to enhance the potential growth of European economies and to continue to promote sustainable growth and enduring job creation. The European Council meeting held in Luxembourg in 1997 explicitly mentioned structural policies among the items selected for reinforced co-ordination. The Lisbon and Stockholm European Councils, held in 2000 and 2001, further enhanced the medium term strategy necessary for structural reforms in the Union. This strategy aims at raising the potential growth and strengthening the competitiveness of the EU economies.

It is also crucial that we retain flexibility in the implementation of our asset purchase programmes, to avert any potential financial fragmentation problems. Second, in the current phase of the crisis, in which problems are more concentrated in specific sectors, policies aimed at supporting firms should be adjusted by targeting them on those firms most affected by the shock. In addition, a more selective approach that gives priority to supporting viable business projects should be considered. In the particular case of loan guarantee programs, it may be necessary to expand these facilities in future, but some of their parameters could be adjusted (i. e. the percentage of public guarantee) in order to incentivize lending by banks to viable firms. Finding the right balance between continuing to provide the necessary protection and maintaining a sufficient degree of selectivity will require the practically constant reassessment and adaptation of these instruments in coming quarters. Third, so far, fiscal support has focused on averting the materialisation of liquidity risks. This strategy has been very successful in this regard, but firms have accumulated more debt as a result. Further accumulation of debt might prove unsustainable for firms with a high level of indebtedness. Here, public support in the form of temporary equity injections could be an option to explore, especially in the case of large companies where this option seems more feasible. The Spanish Government has already set up a public fund that can be used for that purpose. For other firms, direct grants could be considered.
There is a risk that young households now making their debut in the housing market have lost touch with history and become used to annual percentage increases in house prices of around ten per cent or more. Naturally, households cannot base their private financial calculations on property prices continuing to rise sharply. A person who bought their housing 10 years ago has probably made a good deal, but seen in the longer term, housing has not been a spectacular form of investment. Another change in the mortgage market that might have consequences for the real economy in particular, is that an increasing percentage of lending to households is at a variable interest rate. This, combined with the high indebtedness, has meant that changes in general interest rates have had a greater impact on households’ private finances. Households’ increased appetite for variable loans has so far coincided with low interest rates, which has meant that many households have seen their interest costs fall. If interest rates rise, these costs will increase just as quickly, and households with very substantial loans and a large share of these at a variable interest rate, will face significant cost increases Given that house prices have risen so rapidly in recent years, it is natural to wonder how long this development can continue. In recent months there have been indications that the housing market may be entering a calmer phase.

Philipp M Hildebrand: Current monetary policy situation and economic prospects Speech by Dr Philipp M Hildebrand, Member of the Governing Board of the Swiss National Bank, at “Finanzinstitute Thurgau bei der Universität Konstanz”, Kreuzlingen, 26 April 2004. The complete speech can be found in German on the Swiss National Bank’s website (www.snb.ch). *  *  *  Due to the vigorous monetary and fiscal policy stimuli from the US, the global economy is expanding again. In Switzerland, too, the upswing has become a reality. In the current year, the Swiss National Bank (SNB) is expecting growth of 1.5% - 2%, which slightly exceeds the present growth potential. Since capacity utilisation is still fairly modest, such economic growth does not bring an immediate threat of inflation for Switzerland at the moment. The downward risks still existing therefore justify a cautious monetary policy. In order to be able to ensure price stability in the medium term, the SNB must, however, bring its expansionary monetary policy back on normal course again as soon as the economic recovery sets in and capacity utilisation improves markedly. BIS Review 24/2004  1