samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
And despite the central bank’s policy rate not being an ideal tool in this context, it may nevertheless play a useful role, together with macroprudential policy, when it comes to preventing imbalances. Leaning against the wind is therefore vindicated – an expression Smets uses as an overall term for this view. Preventing financial imbalances should thus be included in the tasks of monetary policy, in addition to price stability. This means that the central banks have more deliberations to make and that monetary policy becomes more complicated than it was prior to the crisis. But it is nevertheless not a completely different framework.8 “Financial stability is price stability” The third view goes even further. According to this, the objectives of financial stability and price stability are so closely linked that they cannot really be separated – financial stability is price stability, to use Smets’ expression.9 It is therefore not appropriate to separate monetary policy and macroprudential policy. Traditional monetary policy can also be regarded as stabilising the financial system in the sense that it oils the wheels of the monetary transmission mechanism and counteracts financial markets that are functioning poorly. Taken to an extreme, this view probably means that the standard monetary policy strategy would need to change on a more fundamental level. 6  Smets (2013). 7  One example of this view is Svensson (2012). 8  See Woodford (2012) for an example of this view. 9  Smets takes the so-called I Theory of Money as an example of this view.

Malta has also adopted the European Directive of 4th April 2001 on the reorganisation and winding up of credit institutions and their branches in Member States, which should facilitate the harmonisation of any eventual measures that may have to be taken in this regard. In compliance with EU legislation on the promotion of international payments, the Central Bank has meanwhile brought into force the Directive on Cross-border Credit Transfers. Another Directive, on Electronic Payments Services, which seeks to ensure a high level of consumer protection in the field of electronic payment instruments, came into force on May 1st this year. Looking forward, we believe that Malta’s financial system is well placed to benefit from EU membership. While the banks may face some challenges from increased competition, there will also be opportunities for growth. In particular, Malta is well positioned to serve as a bridgehead between Europe and North Africa, and some Maltese banks have already been exploiting this market niche, participating actively in the Mediterranean Bank Network set up after the Barcelona Declaration of 1995. The recent emergence of Libya on the international scene, a country with considerable potential with which Malta has long maintained close commercial ties, should also open up further opportunities in this direction. Malta’s inherent qualities, moreover, make it an attractive location. The island has a stable economic and political environment as well as a highly qualified and motivated workforce in the legal, accounting and consulting services professions and in banking and finance.
On the other hand, due to its high share in the expenditures of especially low-income households and corresponding purchasing power effects, food prices are given a great importance by policy makers. Meanwhile, the metals, such as iron ore, copper and aluminum, are among the most important raw materials for the industry and construction sector. The reason why commodity prices have been frequently attracting attention is the current fluctuations in commodity prices of a magnitude that has not been seen since 2007. Price of brent crude oil, which was USD 50 per barrel in early 2007, climbed to USD 145 within one and a half year. Then, parallel to the deepening global crisis in late 2008, crude oil prices went back to USD 35; and now it is hovering around USD 125. And the uncertainties about oil prices, resulting from demand and supply-side developments, and their potential effects keep the policymakers interest in commodity prices alive in the current economic outlook. As they are among the risk factors that affect the inflation outlook, we directly referred to commodity prices, mostly to those of crude oil and food, in our latest inflation reports. As a matter of fact, nearly half of the revisions about official inflation forecasts published in our inflation reports in the last couple of years originated from the changes in our assumptions about food and commodity prices. This suggests that the rise in commodity prices may bring about challenges for central banks not only in terms of direct pressures on inflation.

Erdem Başçi: The importance of commodity price movements Opening remarks by Mr Erdem Başçi, Governor of the Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey, at the Conference on “Policy responses to commodity price movements”, Istanbul, 6 April 2012. *  *  *  Distinguished guests, Welcome to the conference on the “Policy Responses to Commodity Price Movements” jointly organized by the International Monetary Fund, the IMF Economic Review and the Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey. As I will deliver another speech in the panel session on the second day of the conference, I will attempt to keep this inaugural speech as brief as possible. As you will recall, we hosted a conference on commodity price volatility in Istanbul last September within the context of G-20 program. These two conferences on similar topics in such a short time are clear indicators of how important the commodity price movements are for the global economy. Why are commodity prices so important? When we think of what is covered by “commodities” more closely, we also come up with how we should approach this issue. Usually, the term “commodity prices” represent energy prices (mainly the crude oil), food prices and the prices of some main industrial inputs. Energy prices are very closely monitored by economic units and policy makers, for it denotes the cost of one of the most significant inputs for the entire economy. Energy is one of the primary cost factors for firms. It is also a considerable item for households’ heating and transportation expenditures.
They include a successful stabilisation policy, whereby inflation was reined in even though capacity utilisation has been high, as well as an efficient labour market, where unemployment has been lower than for several decades without leading to higher inflation. A number of occasional factors also contributed: the dollar has been strong when this was needed to restrain inflationary impulses; a reduction of employers’ health insurance contributions has helped to hold wage costs down; and so on. Some years ago, the general opinion among economists was that these cyclical factors, together with an efficient labour market, sufficed to explain much of the good performance. Recently, however, this view has been modified. The strong productivity growth, which is unusual so far into a demand-driven upswing, has raised the question of the extent to which the advances in IT may have played a part as well. 1  BIS Review 18/2000  Compared with earlier decades, productivity growth in the United States, as in most other industrialised countries, was weak from 1970 up to the mid-1990s. Yet this was a period when computers with a steadily growing capacity were being introduced on a wide front. As Robert Solow, the Nobel laureate, observed in 1987, “You can see computers everywhere except in the productivity statistics”. In the closing years of the century, however, productivity growth in the United States showed clear signs of climbing back to the levels in the 1950s and 1960s.

More can be done collaboratively with national agencies to propagate successful financial education strategies; to promote more effective coordination with financial inclusion and financial stability mandates; and to develop frameworks, tools and guidance that can be adapted to local conditions. Frameworks for evaluating the effectiveness and measurement of financial education initiatives should be developed to avoid pitfalls that can lead to poor outcomes despite significant time and resources invested in many activities. At the regional level, consumer protection measures are being developed in tandem with the proposed economic measures to achieve greater economic integration under the ASEAN Free Trade Area. For the region, enhancing financial literacy of consumers will be an important consideration in raising the standards for consumer protection frameworks and in promoting financial inclusion. I expect that this will be discussed at the ASEAN Roundtable which will take place tomorrow and I encourage your active contribution to this important dialogue. The roundtable discussion will provide opportunities for ASEAN policymakers to share countries’ experiences, exchange key insights on promising approaches and to explore new ideas and identify opportunities to deepen collaboration at the regional level. These are important matters as it enables policy makers to formulate new development policies and better strategies. It has been a very productive symposium. The dedication and commitment expressed by those who have participated so actively in the various sessions should energise and inspire us all to strive even harder and achieve more to improve the well-being of our communities.
What, in view of all this, is the appropriate policy response to the current inflation? Most of the overshoot relative to target in the latest CPI numbers – more than all of it, on some measures15 – reflects unusually strong inflation in goods prices. In all likelihood that will also be true of the larger overshoot we’re going to see towards the end of this year. And if this was only a story about global goods prices – and depending how confident you were in its transitory nature – I think the answer could well be “nothing”. There’s a clear parallel with changes in oil prices. In that case the most reasonable assumption is generally that the direct effect on inflation will be gone in a year or so, before monetary policy could do much about it. Subject to any “second-round” effects on wages, the orthodox view is therefore that policy should “look through” the immediate impact. (Note that this applies as much to falls as rises. In early 2015, for example, a big drop in the price of oil pushed headline UK inflation into negative territory, more than two percentage points below target. But, despite a lot of chatter at the time about “deflation”, the MPC did not ease policy because it thought the effect would probably be transitory.) The parallel isn’t exact. Oil only needs to go through a simple refining process before it appears in the local petrol station and the general pass-through to retail energy prices is therefore fairly immediate.

23.10.2019  The Banking Union: a key building block of the EU project Opening remarks at roundtable “Banking Union – Five years in the making” Banco de España Margarita Delgado Deputy Governor  Dear chairs of the Single Supervisory Mechanism and the European Banking Authority, president of the European Banking Federation, ladies and gentlemen, good morning. Let me start by welcoming you to Banco de España for this roundtable. Over the next couple of hours we intend to discuss both the achievements and pending elements of the Banking Union (BU) on its fifth anniversary. We are honoured to be accompanied by such distinguished panelists, so thank you for accepting our invitation and for being here today. But before getting down to the discussion, I would like to share with you a few general thoughts on the European Union project and the role the Banking Union (BU) plays as part of this collective endeavour. In my remarks today I will point out what the BU has meant in terms of greater integration for the euro area banking sector, and I will also refer briefly to those developments that, in my view, may still be missing if we are to achieve a truly integrated and cross-border banking sector. The EU project has certainly improved the life of millions of people in Europe since its creation, not only in economic terms, but also regarding rights and living standards across the whole Union.
That is the reason why I fully subscribe to the declaration of our President, Wim Duisenberg, in the name of the Governing Council: “European citizens can be assured that the future of the euro is that of a strong currency, based on price stability and the strength of the European economy.” A stable, a solid, a strong euro is in the interest of Europe. –  On the People’s Republic of China, I would like to praise the highly responsible attitude which has been adopted by Beijing during the Asian crisis. China has played a decisive role in helping stabilize the full body of the Region and has gained an immense credit not only in Asia but in the global community as a whole. I entirely share the sentiment of Premier Zhu on the role of the prudent monetary policy of the People’s Bank of China in that success. I have been impressed by the quality of the contributions delivered in the occasion of the 21st Century Forum. If there is a lesson I draw from the exchange of views, here under the auspices of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, it would be the decisive importance of foreign direct investments in the development of the economy of China. FDI’s are the best recipe for a successful and balanced globalization. BIS Review 52/2000  6

In both cases, he is able to capture the macroeconomic implications of decisions made at the firm level, linking micro and macro questions. I conclude by extending my congratulations to Professor Bloom. BIS central bankers’ speeches  1
Service industries and the construction sector expect that continued low interest rates and strong growth in household demand will contribute to further increasing activity in the near term. As estimated here, capacity utilisation in the Norwegian economy is now close to a normal level. In manufacturing, capacity utilisation has been close to its historical average. According to Norges Bank’s regional network, about 40 per cent of enterprises will have some or considerable difficulty if production must be increased. The situation in the labour market does not indicate a build-up of substantial pressures in the Norwegian economy as a whole, even though growth has been high for a fairly long period. So far, the rise in the number of employed has been fairly moderate in relation to output growth. This may be due to lagged effects of the sharp fall in sickness absence through 2004. Many companies have probably not fully utilised the large increase in available person-hours. A considerable share of production growth so far this year may be the result of an improved utilisation of the existing workforce. In  addition, productivity, measured in terms of value added per person-hour, increased at a fairly brisk pace in the last couple of years. In addition to high productivity growth and a reduction in sickness absence, it appears that the use of foreign labour has increased recently. The level is relatively moderate, but appears nonetheless to have reduced bottleneck tendencies in some industries where demand has increased sharply.

Over time, a strong krone and weak demand among major trading partner countries will probably have a dampening impact on activity in Norway. Little excess production capacity in OPEC countries, combined with the prospect of lower production in non-OPEC countries, has probably influenced oil prices. At the same time, there are prospects of continued strong demand growth in important oil-importing countries, such as China and some other emerging economies. More on the oil market The IMF has analysed supply and demand in the oil market for the period ahead in the latest issue of “World Economic Outlook”, published in April of this year. Assuming an annual global GDP growth of approximately 3 per cent and an oil price in line with market expectations in February 2005,1 demand for oil is expected to increase by around 2 per cent per year until 2030. Price expectations are higher now, but according to IMF calculations, the demand for oil in the long-term reacts relatively little to price changes. The growth in demand primarily reflects higher demand for fuel for motor vehicles, particularly in non-OECD countries. An increase in per capita income in China will in particular lead to a sharp increase in car use. Output in non-OPEC countries will peak in the not-too-distant future – in 5 years, according to IMF estimates. Higher demand will require higher output in OPEC countries. These countries have substantial oil resources but are currently producing close to capacity. Production capacity must therefore be increased.
Separation, it was said, avoided reputational contamination of monetary policy from financial firm failure. This, however, came at one obvious cost: it severed, institutionally, any link between the micro and macro, the brain and the hands. This would come back to haunt, not just the Bank but the world, a decade later. After the separation of the Bank from the Financial Services Authority (FSA), the new financial services regulator, the Bank found itself with too little international resource. This was unfortunate because the Asian financial crisis was raging. Two new international divisions were set up to plug this gap – one on the monetary policy side headed by Andrew Bailey (another whose progress I have lost track of), the other on the financial stability side headed by me. I moved to set up the new division on Monday 10 August 1998. The following Monday, Russia defaulted on its debts and devalued the rouble, triggering another emerging market-cum-global crisis. The next day I briefed Eddie George on the Russian crisis. Eddie spoke Russian, had worked in Russia and had an astute working knowledge of the Russian economy. I was in week two. I wasn’t long into my briefing before eyebrows were raised. The next few years brought crises aplenty as they spread contagiously through emerging markets. Spotting these crises, their unique dynamics, the way markets turn, the blend of politics and economics, is part instinct, part science. The emerging market crises at the time enabled me to cut my teeth on understanding financial crises.

At present, we base our forecasts on the development of the repo rate expected by the financial markets. Professors Giavazzi and Mishkin give several reasons why they advocate that the Riksbank should present its own interest rate forecasts. Perhaps the most important reason is that this would show most clearly what the Riksbank’s own expectations of future monetary policy are. This would make it easier for companies and households to plan for the future. This point of view is easy to agree with, and I have expressed similar thoughts myself in various speeches. We are currently considering and working on how this might be achieved. Compensating for earlier deviations from target As I mentioned to begin with, there are a couple of points where I do not agree entirely with the authors’ conclusions. One such point is how the Riksbank should act if inflation has been below, or above, target for a long period of time. Professors Giavazzi and Mishkin suggest that if inflation has been below target for a long period of time, monetary policy should partly compensate for this by being extra expansionary in the future. As I understand it, the background to this is the developments in recent years, when inflation has been below the target. Here it is worth pointing out that when inflation has been below target level for a long period of time, there have been good explanations for this. The most recent episode has mainly been due to the fact that productivity growth has been surprisingly high.
In Vietnam, consumers use OnePay to make financial transactions. Wing in Cambodia, BCEL in Laos and Wave Money in Myanmar provide instant payments and money transfers through mobile phones to those without bank accounts. Last but not least, Thailand’s PromptPay provides consumers with one of the most efficient fund transfer services in the region, using mobile phone or citizen ID numbers as a proxy for bank account numbers. The Bank of Thailand also set up a “regulatory sandbox” framework to support development of financial innovations. This framework allows innovators to test their products, and regulators to develop necessary regulatory requirements before innovative products are launched to the public. Nevertheless, embracing financial technology at the domestic level is not enough. We need to create linkages among domestic payment platforms and innovative financial products to facilitate cross-border financial activities. Thailand has been active in enhancing inter-platform linkages. On a bilateral level, Thai banks and FinTech firms are developing cross-currency remittance services based on blockchain technology. At the regional level, Thailand’s national interbank payment system has recently been selected to be the hub of the Asian Payment Network (APN). Ladies and gentlemen, As we all know, FinTech comes with new risks. Cyber threats, in recent years, have increased dramatically in frequency, sophistication and impacts. This leads to my second area of cooperation. AFCA members may wish to cooperate to build immunity to lessen the impact of unwarranted risks. Among others, AFCA could serve as a forum to ensure that cooperation on cyber security is brought to fruition.

It is thus no exaggeration to say that those present at a similar dinner six years ago felt quite optimistic about the prospects for the European economy, within Monetary Union, although the Union had only just taken its very first steps and euro banknotes and coins had not even begun to circulate. We now have the benefit of the experience built up in the intervening period. The euro has meant tangible benefits in terms of savings on transaction costs for citizens, eliminating exchange rate risks within the area, facilitating market integration and it has provided an environment of economic and monetary stability. The ECB has attained high credibility in a short period of time which is undoubtedly a result of the clarity of its objectives, the effectiveness of its strategy and the soundness of its decisions. Nevertheless, it is a fact that the European economy has not managed to repeat growth figures close to those seen in 2000. It has been prone to bouts of notable sluggishness, highlighting - in addition to the effect of an unusual series of adverse shocks - the structural shortcomings holding back activity and employment. We have therefore seen that, despite the favourable effects a monetary policy unequivocally geared to price stability has on economic prosperity, the full effectiveness of its contribution requires an ambitious reform agenda in other economic policy spheres.