samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
World output expanded at its fastest rate for 30 years in 2004, and this year growth looks like being as strong again. One obvious explanation is that both high oil prices and the strength in the world economy have reflected the rapid pace of development in  1  2  Data from OECD’s International Migration Outlook 2006. BIS Review 116/2006  China, where growth has been around 10% a year since 2004, and which last year was responsible for nearly half of the growth in total world oil demand. So the two have helped to offset each other. But the recent behaviour of oil prices has also reflected supply-side problems. The rapid growth in demand seems to have taken oil producers by surprise. The world is currently operating on a very thin margin of spare oil production capacity as a result of low investment in the 1990s. The result is that oil prices have also been volatile, as well as high, moving sharply in response to geopolitical and weather-related news, as well as changing expectations about world demand and supply. In time, both supply and demand will respond to higher prices, but the lead times for new production capacity are very long – around ten years to develop a new field. High and volatile oil prices pose a grisly challenge for monetary policy makers. But so far there has been no surge in inflation across the world as there was following the oil price increases in the 1970s.

With regard to the outlook for Sweden, the Riksbank foresees an average annual growth rate of almost 3 per cent in the coming years. Looking at inflation prospects, the rate of price increases is expected to rise in the period ahead as resource utilisation increases in Sweden and abroad. However, a continuation of relatively weak labour market conditions and a favourable cost situation mean that the rise in inflation is expected to be relatively moderate in Sweden. Our forecast in the Report is for a risk-adjusted inflation rate of 1.1 per cent one year ahead and 1.8 per cent two years ahead, measured as UND1X inflation. Swedish housing finance On 1 July this year the Act on issuing secured bonds (2003:1223) will come into force. One of the main incentives behind the new Act is to offer Swedish mortgage institutions the same favourable financing opportunities that these institutions face in European countries that have already introduced similar legislation. So will this new legislation result in a new financing structure for Swedish mortgage institutions and in large issue volumes in the international markets? This remains to be seen. The Riksbank has, for reasons of principle, been hesitant towards the introduction of the legislation on secured bonds, primarily because the supervisory task charged to Finansinspektionen (the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority) could be perceived as an implied government guarantee, but also because the legislation in this field entails a return to regulation in the credit market, which in itself can be questioned.
Your Excellency Allow me also to state one issue that is of particular importance to, especially, developing countries, like ours. It has been established that effective national capacity-building requires adoption of international best practices. But for a developing country to benefit from this process effectively it would require citizens who are not only technically competent, but also fluent in writing, reading and speaking major international languages, among which French is key. For this reason, most professionals from Anglophone countries, Zambia inclusive, have failed to secure jobs in international organisations, mainly on account of their inability to communicate in a major international language other than English, such as French, which most often is a requirement for securing employment in international organisations. In this connection, we are happy to sign this MoU, whose principal objectives are to: (a)  establish a framework in which the French embassy can facilitate capacity building in the French language among the Bank of Zambia employees;  (b)  promote multi-cultural awareness and appreciation of a diversity of languages necessary for bank staff to transact effectively and efficiently in social and professional fora where the knowledge of French would be beneficial; and  (c)  enhance opportunities for bilateral and/or multilateral co-operation between the Bank and relevant French-speaking authorities and clients.

Notwithstanding the above, the French lessons programme is a very challenging one to our staff in that students are not only required to attend, at least, 90 per cent of class work conducted twice a week for two hours, but are also required to take examinations every ten (10) weeks; implying that only those employees who succeed in the examinations are allowed to proceed to the next advanced level. Your Excellency Following the commencement of the French lessons, I am pleased to inform you that this programme has already started showing encouraging results, as evidenced by the fact that at the end of the first segment of the beginners’ course, all those who took the examinations passed and are progressing to the next stage. The results could have been even better had all the 78 enrolled students attended tuition and taken the examination as scheduled. Let me also clarify here that some employees missed the examinations due to the call of duty and not out of lack of commitment. In this regard, I wish to assure Your Excellency that as a sign of commitment on the part of individual employees and the bank, a crush programme has been put in place to enable those who missed the first examination to sit for it and catch up with the rest of the class by April this year.
From 1986 to 1990, monetary policy was oriented towards maintaining a fixed exchange rate against a trade-weighted basket of currencies. In 1990, the krone was pegged to the European currency unit, the ECU. The peg was abandoned in December 1992 when international currency turbulence compelled Norway and several other countries to discontinue the fixed exchange rate system against the ECU. However, monetary policy was still geared towards maintaining a stable krone exchange rate against European currencies. The ECU was used as the main reference for European currencies. The euro took over this role when it was introduced on 1 January 1999. BIS Review 90/2001  1  Developments since the beginning of 1997 indicated that the exchange rate was no longer an appropriate operational target of monetary policy. Norges Bank therefore placed increasing emphasis on low and stable inflation as a precondition for exchange rate stability. In our opinion, the best contribution monetary policy could make to a stable krone exchange rate against the euro was low and stable inflation in line with inflation in the euro area. Monetary policy was therefore oriented towards bringing inflation over time into line with that aimed at by the European Central Bank. Guidelines for economic policy in Norway  On 29 March, the Government issued new guidelines for monetary policy. Monetary policy shall now be oriented towards low and stable inflation. The operational target of monetary policy is consumer price inflation of 2½ per cent.

Since December 2000, growth forecasts for our trading partners have been halved for 2001. The tragic events of 11 September will have a further dampening effect on activity in the US, Asia and European economies. In the euro area, high oil prices, livestock diseases, the decline in the ICT sector and reduced demand in the US have had a negative impact on economic developments. GDP growth has also slowed considerably over the last year. Unemployment has shown a substantial decline in recent years and is low in many of the smaller countries. Unemployment is high in the large countries. Particular structural features, such as wide regional disparities, are contributing to the high level of overall unemployment. The terrorist attacks of 11 September have reduced demand in the aviation and travel industries. The European Central Bank has cut its key rates by 1 percentage point so far this year. Until the autumn, the Norwegian economy had remained relatively insulated from the world economic slowdown. It now appears clear that Norway will also be affected by the slowdown. A number of Norwegian enterprises in export industries and the travel industry have felt the effects of growing caution among households and businesses worldwide. Investment in mainland enterprises will probably also decline. However, the economic situation in Norway is different from that of the euro area. The Norwegian economy is still characterised by high capacity utilisation with a limited supply of labour. Registered unemployment has been low and stable since the autumn of 1998.
We must also recognise that there will be occasions when interventions are not yet needed, as emerging risks are not yet systemic in nature. To return to our analogy, a good doctor might decide not to start medication, but instead simply monitor a patient’s general health to judge better how to improve it. Macro-prudential policy should be ready to adapt to change, allowing the economy to expand and innovate safely. Change always brings with it opportunities and risks and so our macro-prudential framework will need to evolve. To overuse the health analogy once more, doctors need to adapt. A doctor in the 1960s, for example, would never have had to think about the health effects of vaping. Challenges that lie ahead Ten years after establishing the FPC, we have reached the point where we have both made the case for macro-prudential policy, and built a macro-prudential framework designed to ensure the sector is resilient to stress. In other words, we have pulled together the skeleton for a healthcare plan and convinced the patient that they need it and that it needs to be updated regularly. These are important achievements. Indeed we need to make sure we hang on to them even as memories of the global financial crisis fade. But we need to decide the plan for the coming months and years too. Recent shocks – the  Covid pandemic, and more recently, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – and structural changes to the financial system have reaffirmed that our work is not yet done.

The wood and wood products industry accounts for about a fourth of manufacturing employment. As in the rest of the country, the public sector and parts of the private service sector are important for employment in Hedmark. Business and financial services account for a smaller share than the national average. In spite of interest rate cuts and a stimulatory government budget, overall economic policy has been tight as a result of the strong krone. The depreciation of the krone exchange rate since January and the reduction in the interest rate have, however, contributed to an easing of monetary policy. In the Inflation Report, we presented two alternative scenarios for the Norwegian economy. In the baseline scenario, where the interest rate is held constant at 5½ per cent and the krone exchange rate at the average for the past month, mainland GDP is projected to increase by 1¼ per cent this year and 2 per cent next year. This is lower than what is considered the long-term growth potential in the economy. In 2005, growth is projected at 2¼ per cent. An alternative scenario, which incorporates monetary policy easing in line with market expectations - as they were then, points to higher growth over time. The rise in prices for goods and services produced in Norway is being influenced by markedly higher wage growth in Norway relative to trading partners. Wage growth moved up further last year, even in industries where profitability had weakened considerably.
Eddie Yue: Why challenges reinforce Hong Kong’s value as an international financial centre Keynote speech by Mr Eddie Yue, Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, at the Asian Academy of International Law Conference “Why challenges reinforce Hong Kong’s value as an international financial centre”, 26 February 2021. * * *  Opening 1. Good afternoon. I am delighted to be your keynote at this important event today. I thank the Secretary of Justice, Tony (Neoh) and Stephen (Phillips) for inviting me. 2. This conference is titled ‘Why Hong Kong is irreplaceable’. And in the context of international finance, I think it’d be fair to start this session with a question rather than a statement and ask: why is Hong Kong irreplaceable? 3. The answer is that no city is totally irreplaceable as a financial centre. For decades, London has been established as one of the leading global financial hubs. But even with this entrenched position, we have been hearing questions whether London can maintain this dominance in Europe after Brexit. 4. Or look further back in time. Modern banking was probably pioneered in Genoa in the 15th century. But no-one sees this picturesque Italian city as a financial centre today. In China, Pingyao in Shanxi was once the cradle of banking during the Qing dynasty; it is now more of an open-air museum for tourists. 5. The truth is that what financial centres do is irreplaceable, not where they are.

European financial markets calmer thanks to monetary policy If you take a look at chart 1, you can follow the movements in both the euro/Swiss franc exchange rate and the average risk premium for the government bonds of five peripheral euro area countries (Italy, Spain, Greece, Portugal and Ireland). The risk premium is drawn on an inverted scale, in other words, a movement downwards signifies a higher risk. This chart serves as an illustrative example for two developments. On the one hand, it shows that uncertainty in the euro area has decreased greatly over the past twelve months. At the time of the last Money Market Event in Geneva, the risk premium was almost 1,200 basis points; it is now below 400. On the other hand, the chart illustrates the fact that the upward pressure on the Swiss franc has abated. Following a long period last year when the exchange rate stuck closely to the minimum exchange rate of CHF 1.20, it moved away in January and, since May, has fluctuated within a relatively narrow range of CHF 1.22–1.26 per euro. BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  Here, the situation has calmed in two respects. In order to reduce the risk of the euro area collapsing, the European Central Bank (ECB) resorted to an unconventional measure in late summer 2012, the outright monetary transactions programme. Market participants were persuaded, and since then the risk premium for peripheral economies in Europe has declined steadily. What is remarkable is how persistent this trend has been.
But as the weight of exchange rate-linked items in domestic balance sheets declines, and as confidence rises and the foundations for the exchange rate itself are strengthened, monetary policy can devote greater attention to the slack in the economy and the inflation outlook. In this context, three factors are most important: returning domestic financial institutions to full functionality, converting foreign-denominated debt to domestic currency, and restoring access to foreign credit and financial markets. It is important to enhance the effectiveness of the Central Bank’s monetary policy instruments and improve the transmission mechanism of monetary policy. While confidence in the financial market remains limited, the Central Bank’s policy instruments will not be fully effective because, under these circumstances, financial institutions have every reason to consider it more beneficial to do business with the Central Bank than among themselves. The Central Bank has set a framework for the money market, foreign exchange market, and bond market, thereby contributing to their resurrection, in co-operation with the authorities and the financial institutions. At this point in time, it is primarily the bond market that has  BIS Review 39/2010  3  shown signs of recovery. However, financial institutions’ conduct still shows that they are uncertain about the future, and the premises for trading are distorted to some degree. Finding a solution to this will be an important task in the coming months. At present, investment in Iceland is close to a post-WWII low.

According to the most recent forecast, it can be assumed that investment as a share of GDP will be under 14% in 2010, the lowest ratio since the end of the War. Exports can drive GDP growth for a while, but a lasting recovery and stable growth require a reinstatement of investment in value-generating commercial activities. Domestic interest rates have been blamed for the sluggishness of investment activity, and certainly, financing costs are an important factor in investment. Under current circumstances, however, it would be fantasy to maintain that a sizeable interest rate cut would catalyse a turnaround in investment. Considering how strong investment was during the upswing years, the Bank’s surveys show that current investment trends in Iceland are similar to those in other countries that have experienced financial crises. Furthermore, it should be borne in mind that business investment is minimal in most industrial nations at present, even though their interest rates are very low. Risk aversion in the wake of financial crisis and economic recession, together with uncertainty about future demand, are hurdles to investment. The Central Bank’s studies and informal surveys indicate that the same situation prevails here in Iceland. Added to this are heavy indebtedness, uncertainty about companies’ future operational environment, and limited access to foreign credit. Consequently, it will require more than interest rate cuts to stimulate investment.
BIS Review 124/2006  3  •  Anglo-saxon countries which are very good at producing financial assets have already shown enormous imbalances, with US current account deficit and housing market bubbles as the headline examples;  •  emergence of (long lasting) asset bubbles and drop in inflation (and possibly even emergence of deflation) are market mechanisms to bridge the asset gap;  •  bursting an asset bubble makes asset shortages problem worse;  •  while financial markets development moves ahead (think about large listings in China, improving corporate governance or rapid development of credit derivatives) it is unlikely that excess demand for assets will be eliminated soon, as it seems to have a structural origin, related to demographics (aging), or to higher uncertainty for corporations operating in more competitive global economy in XXI century, which probably explains why profits to GDP ratio is at 40-years high and investments fail to recover to pre-Asia-crisis and pre-dot-com-boom levels  It does matter to what view of the world you subscribe, as it dramatically alters the subjective likelihood of competing scenarios for 2007. As PIMCO Michael Gomez puts it in September emerging markets note titled “Is it safe?” 19 : “EM has historically been vulnerable to deteriorating economic and financial conditions in the United States and other developed countries.

The downturn was remarkable symmetrical and counteracted by a series of interest rate cuts throughout the western world. Sweden was also affected by this downturn, of course, although to a lesser extent than many other countries, particularly because fiscal policy was more expansionary, but also due to the krona being undervalued. Resource utilisation was therefore assessed to be higher in Sweden than in many other areas, which affected the relative interest rate situation. At the beginning of 2002, a wave of optimism began to spread, but it proved short-lived. The main reason for this was the increasing geopolitical unease concerning Iraq and later the war in Iraq. A recovery in the global economy was still expected, but at a later date. The weak economic activity led to further easing of economic policy during 2003. The United States Federal Reserve, the Riksbank and other central banks continued to cut their instrumental rates to all-time low levels. Now most indications are that both the Riksbank and other analysts were slightly too pessimistic in connection with the Iraq war, particularly with regard to the view of economic activity in the US economy, but also developments in Asia. During the second half of 2003 we have had reason to make a further upward revision to our assessments of global economy growth and the picture of the global economy as a whole looks good at present. The US economy is expected to grow at a slightly more rapid rate than we estimated in the December Inflation Report.
The precipitating factors vary but the event as such is simply a matter of time. The collapse in Sweden began in 1991. Share prices were already declining and property prices soon followed suit. The real economy is liable to be affected by falling asset prices, just as it is when asset prices rise. Households perceive a loss of wealth that prompts them to restrain their consumption. Another effect comes from the interaction of the credit market and the balance sheets of households and firms: when asset prices and their value as collateral fall, creditors become less willing to provide loans. In addition, falling asset prices may make banks generally less inclined to provide credit, so that even profitable projects suffer. This can ultimately paralyse the supply of credit and lead to the total collapse of the financial system. While Sweden can be said to have avoided a financial crisis in that sense, both the wealth and the balance-sheet effects probably contributed to the course of the worst economic recession here since the 1930s. Demand in general fell, financial saving rose and credit was rapidly repaid. The steep reduction of the loan stock in the first half of the 1990s is evident from Diagram 1. BIS Review 127/1999  2  However, a severe bank crisis was only one of the factors that hit the Swedish economy. At times in the early-1990s there was also heavy pressure on the krona. In November 1992 the Riksbank was finally obliged to change to a floating exchange rate.

In this scenario, either much of the past decade of prosperity was an illusion or, alternatively within the space of only a few years, the productive potential of the U.S. collapsed for some unexplained reason. I suppose it is natural to believe that some elements of the story are true. But for me, the evidence for this is minimal, and the implications for productive capacity are exceedingly pessimistic. And even if it is true, the market mechanism should cause wages and prices to adjust in order to reemploy unused resources. For example, there should be some lower real wage that would make it profitable for firms to fund the necessary on-the-job training for workers who need some modest acquisition of skills. According to this pessimistic hypothesis, something is preventing the market’s pricing mechanism from achieving such results within a satisfactory time frame. My own view is more optimistic and, I believe, more consistent with the idea that our best days are ahead. Without a compelling explanation for the hypothesis that the productive capability of the U.S. has been diminished, I think the evidence favors the belief that aggregate demand is simply much too low today. After all, today there are roughly 14 million unemployed Americans. Only a few years ago, there were only about half that many. It is hard to believe that an additional 7 million Americans have suddenly lost the necessary skills to work in today’s economy, and I have not seen any evidence supporting such a dramatic and rapid loss of skills.