samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
The route back to the target must be consistent and credible. This is a necessary condition for inflation expectations remaining stable and in line with the target, which in turn provides us with greater opportunity to also take into account developments in production and employment. 3  Kydland, F. E. and Prescott, E. C. (1977). ”Rules rather than discretion: The inconsistency of optimal plans”. Journal of Political Economy, 85, pp. 473-492. 4  For a more detailed discussion of this, see Woodford, M, (2007).”The case for forecast targeting as a monetary strategy”, Journal of Economic Perspectives, 21:4. pp. 3-24. BIS Review 38/2009  3  This brings me to the point that we as the central bank must be prepared to make unpopular decisions. We have recently cut the repo rate by an unusually large amount and in an unusually short time. Cutting interest rates is a popular decision that is welcomed by most. But the condition for these decisions has been that they do not clash with the inflation target. On the contrary, we have needed to make these decisions so that inflation would not be too low in relation to the target over a long period of time. We are counting on the repo rate remaining at a low level over the whole of this year. But sooner or later we will need to begin raising the repo rate again.

As intermediaries in exchanges, stablecoins are far less effective than a settlement asset with legal tender status, insofar as (i) they are not entirely stable since their price stability depends on the value of a basket of assets, and (ii) they offer no guarantee of a refund in the event of fraud. The fact that they have no intrinsic value and that they offer no guarantee that they may be converted at par upon demand with commercial bank money or central bank money means that they cannot be used to create reliable stores of value. In addition, as pointed out in the G7 report on stablecoins issued last year, stablecoin schemes are significantly exposed to risks of various nature, including legal, financial, operational and compliance risk concerning money laundering and terrorist financing, competition law, consumer and investor protection. The risks identified must be seriously addressed if stablecoins are not to become the « weak links » undermining the safety of our payment systems. This is all the more important as some of these risks would be amplified and new risks might arise if stablecoins are adopted at a global level. Stablecoins of potentially large size and reach – so-called global stablecoins – may indeed pose additional challenges of system-wide importance both domestically and internationally, for the transmission of monetary policy, as well as for financial stability. They could also have implications for the international monetary system more generally, including currency substitution, and could therefore pose challenges to monetary sovereignty.
11  The crisis legislation also relates to another topical question, namely how much venture capital a bank is considered to need. If both authorities and banks know what will happen in a crisis, this should also affect the need for risk-bearing capital in the banks. The desire to be able to manage uncertainty in a crisis is an important motive behind the increased capital requirements in the Basel III Accord. If uncertainty is reduced, the capital need will decline. But the Basel Committee has not made this connection. 10  BIS central bankers’ speeches  But if one is unable to manage even the preparations and procedures surrounding the distribution of costs in a crisis – what is known as ex ante preparations for ex post burden sharing – this will also have consequences. If nothing is discussed in advance, the natural consequence – what is known as the default option – will be that a cross-border bank in distress will be divided along national boundaries, regardless of how it is organised. The branch network in one country may, for instance, suddenly find itself entirely without IT systems and other central administrative functions, which are very costly to build up. The fact that this becomes irrational and can substantially increase the total cost of winding up the bank becomes a problem that cannot be resolved. Fortis and Dexia, at the most recent reconstruction in the autumn, can be said to be good examples of this from the recent crisis.

This reflects several factors. First, such institutions hold assets that are carried mainly on the books on an accrual basis. Compared with mark-to-market assets, such assets adjust much more slowly to changes in market conditions and the economic environment. Second, many of these banks have a much more concentrated exposure to commercial real estate, a sector that remains under considerable pressure. Not only have capitalization rates risen sharply – meaning the investors will pay much less for a dollar of rental income than before – but the rental income streams on these properties also have declined as the performance of the U.S. economy has declined. Together, these two factors have pushed U.S. commercial real estate prices down by about 40 percent to 50 percent from the peak reached in 2006. Loan losses in commercial real estate and consumer and mortgage loans seem likely to continue to pressure smaller banks for some time to come. This in turn means that credit availability to households and small businesses will still be curtailed. The improvement in the overall health of the financial system and in market function has allowed the Federal Reserve to phase out many of the special liquidity facilities that were enacted in response to the crisis. These facilities were generally successful in achieving their objectives – helping to restore confidence and rebuild market liquidity in a way that safeguarded the taxpayers’ interests.
Development of human capital in Islamic finance is also important to ensure an adequate supply of talent pool of experts and high calibre professionals. The investment in human capital development is therefore crucial to support the global development of Islamic financial services industry. Bank Negara Malaysia is committed towards promoting human capital development. Dedicated ancillary institutions such as INCEIF, IBFIM and ISRA have been established to focus on training, education and research. There has also been a higher degree of strategic alliance with British education and training institutions with our Malaysian institutions to advance the talent development for the Islamic financial services industry. In this respect, I am pleased to note that we will today witness the signing of a number of strategic collaboration between leading British institutions and Malaysian education and training institutions. BIS Review 86/2009  3  Let me conclude my remarks. The increasing awareness and appreciation of the inherent strengths of Islamic finance and its tremendous potential for advancement have ignited interests amongst the global financial community to venture into this new sphere of finance. Taking advantage of the increasing role of Islamic finance in bringing together different parts of the world with surplus funds in search of investment opportunities, with those that have financing needs, will increase these mutually reinforcing prospects. We look forward to London's participation in this new financial evolution. 4  BIS Review 86/2009

This is where the introduction of APIs and the greater harmonisation of data through the important move to ISO 20022 can really make a difference. These building blocks have the potential to improve compliance processes and address data handling issues within legacy technology platforms, and maximise the positive impact of the technical, operational and regulatory process changes advanced under the other focus areas. Focus Area E is different: it is more exploratory and long term in nature. It includes assessing the potential for innovative new propositions such as central bank issued digital currencies (CBDCs), privately issued stablecoins and areas that are even less developed such as multilateral payment platforms. These innovations are still in their infancy on a domestic, let alone global, level. But if in time they are introduced, it is really important to consider the possible cross-border benefits they could bring. Importantly, real progress can only be made in these building blocks if work on the earlier building blocks has delivered. Issues around operating hours, AML checks and messaging harmonisation to name but a few will be relevant for these more far reaching innovations. The Roadmap  A broad set of building blocks needs a broad set of players to deliver them. And that is why the Stage 3 roadmap is so important. The FSB, working with the CPMI and other relevant international organisations and standard-setting bodies, today published an ambitious but achievable roadmap to deliver these building blocks including initial actions and milestones 7.
4.0 billion to the needy sectors of  Central Bank of Sri Lanka – ROAD MAP 2017  30  the economy and is expected to  implemented with the collaboration  commence in January 2017.  of the Ministry of National Policy and   National Strategy for Financial Inclusion: Based on the findings of the Financial Inclusiveness Survey (FIS), a comprehensive draft of National Strategy for Financial Inclusion will be developed considering the contemporary  Economic Affairs, Ministry of Power and Renewable Energy, Sustainable Energy Authority and other stakeholders, with the intention of promoting rooftop solar power generation in the country.  Promoting Green Financing: In  national financial inclusion strategies  addition, the Central Bank will  of peer countries. The views of  promote Green Financing through  domestic stakeholders, obtained  enhancing awareness to encourage  through continuous dialogue, will be  enterprises to protect the  considered in drafting the proposed  environment, conserve resources  national strategy. and to achieve carbon neutrality.  Promoting Commercial Scale Organic Agriculture and Dairy Entrepreneurship: Addressing the increased concerns of the public and  Banks will also be encouraged to provide financial facilities to green enterprises with the intention of protecting the environment.

We want to  MSME sector development and  emphasise that all our policy measures  employment generation has been  are in line with the current policy stance  designed jointly by the Central Bank  to promote the competitive advantages  and the Ministry of National Policies  of Sri Lanka in global business activities  and Economic Affairs. It constitutes a  resulting in the enhancement of investor  government-led support mechanism  confidence, strengthening of foreign  to address financial, technical,  reserves and stabilising the foreign  marketing and entrepreneurship  exchange market. needs, especially of youth and young  The government has identified that it is timely to have a new Foreign Exchange Act. As proposed in the Budget 2017, the new Foreign Exchange bill will be presented to the Parliament during 2017.  graduates, women and differently abled people. The unique feature of this Scheme is the inclusion of a special grant element for start-up enterprises to meet the initial expenses. The maximum amount of  In addition, the Central bank is in the  the grant will be Rs. 50,000 and the  process of further relaxing foreign  maximum loan amount of  exchange transactions. Rs. 250,000 will be given at an interest of 5.5 per cent per annum. Regional Development: The Central  The Scheme intends to allocate  Bank, as the agent of the Government of  Rs.
The biggest issue here is not the principles involved, but rather the likely future evolution of yields and asset prices. Here I think it is worth stepping back from recent developments to consider the behaviour of yields over a longer horizon. Chart 8 shows the nominal and real yields on UK and US government debt over the past twenty years. Though yields have dipped recently, the most striking feature of this chart is the general downward trend that was evident for some years even before the financial crisis. The causes of this downward trend are still not well understood. Some have pointed to a global “savings glut” associated with unusually high levels of savings in some emerging economies,9 especially China, which have been more than enough to finance the high levels of investment there. That was reflected in downward pressure on global safe interest rates, as well as the pattern of current account imbalances. While the Chinese surplus has fallen in recent years, reflecting in part efforts to stimulate domestic demand, that has been offset by a widening in the surplus of the major oil producers as increased revenues resulting from high oil prices are largely saved rather than spent. While one might expect the Chinese economy to continue to rebalance towards greater reliance on domestic demand and lower savings, that process is likely to take many years to play out, so an early reversal of that factor holding down yields seems unlikely.

In practice, of course, for accounting purposes many pension fund sponsors use an investment-grade corporate bond rate to discount their liabilities; an annex shows what things look like in this case. Chart 4 shows how the deficit of this fund evolves, decomposed into the cumulative contributions of the liabilities (green bars) and assets, comprising equities (red bars) and bonds (blue bars). Note that the deficit rises as high as 30% of initial liabilities in early 2009, reflecting the sharp fall in equity prices during the worst of the financial crisis and subsequent recession. The deficit then falls back as equity prices rally strongly. It then re-emerges in late 2011 and early 2012, reflecting the fall in gilt yields coupled with the more modest movements in equity prices during this episode. Now consider what the picture might have looked like if the MPC had not undertaken any QE. In constructing this counterfactual experiment, I take the estimates of the asset-price impact for QE1 from the work that I discussed earlier, namely that it reduced gilt yields by a percentage point and raised equity prices by 20%, and then simply pro-rate those effects for QE2. I emphasise again that these are only estimates of the effect of QE and are subject to considerable uncertainty, so the results of this exercise should be treated as illustrative rather than definitive. Chart 5 shows the result.
And as I’ve just discussed, the growing belief that the degree of spare capacity in our economy was probably less than might appear at first sight. But I also suggested that policymakers should approach their task with considerable pragmatism, and that if some of the downside risks to growth materialised, I’d reverse my vote. And that indeed is what has happened. The outlook for demand over the past few months has weakened quite materially. Consequently, at the August MPC meeting, I reversed my position and voted to maintain Bank Rate at 0.5% and the stock of asset purchases at £ billion. And as shown in the minutes published this morning, I voted the same way at this month’s MPC meeting. So what has happened to our economy over the past few months? The deterioration in the outlook largely reflects developments outside of our shores. Growth in the world economy, including in our core trading partners in Europe and the US, has slowed. Concerns about the fiscal positions of some countries, particularly within the euro area, have intensified. This in turn has fuelled worries and uncertainties about the resilience of the international banking system. And perhaps most fundamentally of all, confidence that the authorities have the ability to respond to these challenges in a decisive and timely  BIS central bankers’ speeches  7  manner has diminished. These four factors have fed on each other, leading to a pronounced downward spiral. The UK has been caught in the fallout from these external developments.

Qualitative survey balances can be adjusted to match the mean and variance of an estimated productivity gap from which inference about productivity may be drawn. See Charts 3.7 and 3.8 in the August 2011 Inflation Report. 9  Potential productivity is constructed using the BCC surveys of capacity utilisation and productivity data from the ONS for the manufacturing sector and private services excluding finance sector. The BCC survey asks firms whether they are operating at or below full capacity. Since the survey measures are qualitative, they have been mean and variance adjusted over the period 1989 to 2006 to infer a measure of the gap between actual and potential productivity. The trends shown in charts 5 and 6 are chosen such that the shortfall between actual and potential productivity maps closely to the mean-and-variance-adjusted survey measures of spare capacity. 10  The annual flow of business investment prior to the recession averaged around 7% of the UK capital stock. A 20% reduction in business investment for 5 years would result in the capital stock being only around 2% lower (assuming plausible assumptions for the rate of depreciation). 4  BIS central bankers’ speeches  It is possible that this simple arithmetic underestimates the impact of the falls in investment spending, particularly if the falls were concentrated in highly-productive forms of investment. Perhaps because in the face of the deep recession companies were less willing to undertake riskier, high-return investment projects, and the constraints on UK banks made them less willing to finance them.
In this regard I would like to call upon other corporate entities and business houses in Lusaka and other cities around the country to emulate the efforts of the financial sector and help keep Zambia a beautiful, clean and healthy place to live in. I must hasten to mention here that, by undertaking such initiatives, we are in no way trying to take over the responsibility of the local authorities but merely supplementing their efforts of keeping the country clean and healthy. BIS Review 112/2009  1  Hon Minister, allow me to make an earnest appeal to the local authorities through “His Worship the Mayor” to assist in the maintenance of the islands by providing security to minimize the rampant vandalism, theft and destruction of plants and other essentials that occur on a daily basis. We also make a humble request to the Lusaka City Council to consider working on the water reticulation system, as this is one area posing a great challenge in the maintenance of the islands. Furthermore, there are still a number of places, which require urgent attention in the City. Your Worship, we have observed that a number of incomplete buildings have been abandoned posing a danger to the lives of many while others remain without a colour wash for years giving an unattractive sight to our beloved capital city.

On its part, the Bank of Zambia, working with several stakeholders, including Bankers Association of Zambia, has over the years made progress in modernising the payment system. The information technology which serves as a major platform for modern payment systems to operate has also advanced. These developments have set the stage for the development of innovative payment systems capable of serving consumers in a cost effective way. Further, the growth of the number of players as well as the increasing number of initiatives require a robust supporting legal infrastructure to govern the payment system. To this end, the National Payment Systems Act No.1 (NPSA) was enacted in 2007. The NPSA empowered the Bank of Zambia to develop and implement the national payment systems policy so as to promote the efficiency, stability and safety of the Zambian financial system. The Bank of Zambia thus designates players wishing to provide payment services such as money transfer services, mobile banking and other payment services. This process has strengthened the capacity of the BoZ to monitor transactions and to ensure that only safe and efficient institutions are allowed to provide payment services. Distinguished Guests, allow me to conclude by congratulating Ecobank Zambia Limited for the innovative products that we are launching today. We hope that our people can send and receive money conveniently, safely, and at a reasonable cost. I also wish to call upon all banks and financial institutions to emulate Ecobank by introducing such products which contribute to increasing access to banking services for the Zambian people.
Our gratitude also goes to you, our shareholders, for your loyalty to the SNB and your faithful support. Thanks also to our young guests from the Cantonal School of Graubünden for their interest in monetary policy and the SNB. I would like to thank you all for your attention, and I look forward to talking with as many of you as possible over refreshments later. Page 7/8  Chart 1  Chart 2  Page 8/8

Since the summer of last year we have cut our policy rates into negative territory, launched a credit easing package and begun purchasing private and public sector securities under the asset purchase programme (APP). A large body of evidence has accrued in that time that our instruments are powerful. And that evidence has allowed us to refine further our understanding of the amount of stimulus required to bring inflation back to 2% without undue delay. For example, since we launched our credit easing package in June 2014, composite lending rates for firms have declined by more than 80 basis points for the euro area as a whole, and by between 110-140 basis points in stressed economies. That is a formidable pass-through. ECB staff estimates suggest that we would have needed to reduce the standard policy rates by around 100 basis points in June 2014 to achieve a similar effect on bank lending rates. Improving financing conditions have also fed into improving macroeconomic conditions. According to Eurosystem staff assessments, our measures will add almost 1% to GDP between 2015 and 2017. And we are seeing an effect even on smaller firms that are typically harder for monetary policy to reach. In our most recent survey on smaller firms in the euro area, for instance, we saw for the first time since 2009 that the net percentage of small firms registering an improvement in business activity has turned positive, for all size sub-groups. Crucially, our measures are also gradually feeding through into inflation.