samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
The European Commission recently estimated that the single market has brought about an increase of 2.75 million extra jobs and an extra increase in welfare of € per head in 2006, corresponding to a 2.15% increase of the EU’s GDP over the period 1992-2006. 12 However, much remains to be done, in particular in some market services sectors. The extension and deepening of the EU internal market remains clearly a priority as regards further financial market integration, the pursuit of effective competition in the energy market and the implementation of the Services Directive. The growing economic importance of services 13 suggests that improvements in European living standards are likely to depend especially on a high degree of competition and on productivity improvements in the services sector. Let me now focus more specifically on the financial sectors. Financial integration is indeed of key importance for the ECB, given the relevance for the conduct of the single monetary policy. The process of European financial integration is gradually taking place and considerable progress has been made for instance in capital markets and wholesale banking. However, the retail banking sector appears to have not yet reached its potential, and competition seems insufficient in this area leaving European consumers unable to take full advantage of the benefits of the EMU and the Single Market. 14 This seems also to have constrained, to some extent, the economic performance and development of these sectors in the euro area.

Getting more people into work First of all, well-functioning labour markets are indispensable in fostering higher economic growth in the euro area. The still relatively high unemployment rates in the euro area clearly suggest that there is a need to spur not only labour supply but also labour demand. 6  See, for example, A. Alesina, S. Ardagna, G. Nicoletti and F. Schiantarelli (2005), “Regulation and investment”, Journal of the European Economic Association 3, pp. 791-825, in which the authors find that regulatory reforms have had a significant positive impact on capital accumulation in the transport, communication and utilities sectors, especially in the long run. In G. Nicoletti and S. Scarpetta (2003), “Regulation, productivity and growth”, Economic Policy, April, the authors find that various anti-competitive product market regulations significantly reduce total factor productivity growth at the industry level. J. Albert, G. Nicoletti and S. Scarpetta in their contribution to the conference provide a broad survey of the respective literature and some additional evidence. 7  Over the period 1995-2005, hourly labour productivity in the euro area grew on average by 1.6% and 2.5%, in the “wholesale and retail” and “financial” sectors respectively, compared with 3.6% and 3.4% in the United States. Source EUKLEMS database. BIS Review 18/2008  3  As regards labour demand, there is a need to reduce labour market rigidities that currently restrict wage differentiation and flexibility and thus tend to hinder the hiring of younger and older workers in particular.
Fahad Almubarak: Brief review of financial developments in Saudi Arabia Speech by His Excellency Dr Fahad Almubarak, Governor of the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency (SAMA), marking the Seventh Anniversary of Blessed Allegiance Pledge to the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz, Riyadh, 17 May 2012. *  *  *  Saudis celebrate on the 26th of Jumada II 1433H (May 17, 2012) the Seventh Anniversary of the blessed allegiance pledge to the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz. The celebration is a true image of loyalty to the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, who is faithful to his nation’s interests. It is based on well-established bases, in the forefront of which are the tributes of our wise leadership such as the great keenness on the welfare of citizens and the enhancement of the development process. It is difficult to enumerate the achievements of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques in a few words, but, however, I will touch upon some of them.

The Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques has taken a broad range of decisions and measures aiming at restructuring and regulating the economy, updating regulations and legislation to enhance the efficiency and competitiveness of the economy and support the optimal operation of production factors, apart from providing an advanced regulatory and administrative framework and an attractive environment for domestic and foreign investments to achieve diversity in the economic and productive environment in order to continue creating job opportunities for the sons and daughters of the Kingdom. Fortunately, oil prices have constantly improved, helping to accomplish many of the development objectives. As a result, the private sector during the period from 2005 up to the end of 2011 achieved a real annual growth rate averaging 5.5 percent. The balance of payments (BOP) recorded a surplus of Rls 2.5 trillion. The actual expenditure of the public finance stood at Rls 3.8 trillion, of which Rls 1.0 trillion were for capital expenditures. Moreover, the ratio of public debt to GDP declined from 39.2 percent in 2005 to 6.3 percent in 2011. The banking sector recorded strong and constant growth during that period, surpassing significantly the repercussions of the global financial crisis, and total assets of banks rose by more than two fold. Many development projects have been approved for enhancing and modernizing the infrastructure, including roads, airports, telecommunications, water & electricity, health & educational services and the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques’ Foreign Scholarship Program, which is considered as a long-term investment of human resources .
You may not like low rates; indeed the markets anticipate, reasonably in my view, that short-term rates are close to bottoming out. But there can be no doubt about two very real facts that unite us on the Governing Council. Our decisions are guided solely by our mandate of price stability, in the face of inflation that is currently too low at less than 1%. Given the recent slowdown in economic activity – starting with Germany – these low short-term rates must and will remain in place: it would undeniably be a mistake to raise ECB rates now. We are all realists here, so we should focus on two issues: -  The first is clarifying the definition of the ECB’s inflation target, and above all sharing it better with economic agents – businesses and households. This is crucial to allow them to better adjust their inflation expectations; that is precisely the aim of the strategic focus we are going to launch with Christine Lagarde. -  The second issue is limiting the negative effects of low rates on financial stability, and in particular on banks and insurers. We do not lack the tools to do this – you with your strategic adaptation, and us with our “macroprudential” policies. But this brings me to my second part. II. Meeting three major challenges to strengthen euro area banks. I would like to share with you a strong belief: Europe needs strong banks.

In this respect, your central body DZ Bank seems to me to be a good example of a grouping which ensures a geographical and functional complementarity of activities. I welcome the current debates on how to consolidate networks of cooperative and mutual banks in Europe; the German sector has the means of significantly contributing to these debates. Page 7 sur 7 ** Thanks to you, I have discovered Raiffeisen’s beautiful phrase: "Several persons have the ability to do what is impossible for one individual.” iv This phrase perfectly describes the ambition of mutual banks. But it is also, I believe, a model of thought for Europe. In this uncertain world, shaken by the rivalry between the United States and China, Germany and France must, more than ever, overcome their differences. The entry into office of the new European Commission, around Ursula von der Leyen, must be an opportunity to move forward together. It's now, or never. Europeans expect no less. Thank you for your attention. References: i  “Shock Resistant”, France’s Attractiveness Survey, EY, June 2019.  ii  Laurent Abraham, Jean-Baptiste Gossé, “The euro: is the grass always greener on the other side?”, Banque de France blog, May 2019. iii  EBA source and sample. iv  "Was dem Einzelnen nicht möglich ist, das vermögen viele."
“How Should Monetary Policy Respond to Asset-Price Bubbles?” in A. Richards and T. Robinson, eds., Asset Prices and Monetary Policy, 260–280. Reserve Bank of Australia: Sydney. Heikensten, Lars (2009). “Inflation Targeting 20 Years On”, Presentation at 6th Norges Bank Monetary Policy conference, Oslo, June 12. Joyce, Michael, Ana Lasaosa, Ibrahim Stevens and Matthew Tong (2010). “The Financial Market Impact of Quantitative Easing,” Bank of England Working Paper No.393. Kamenik, Ondra, Heesun Kiem, Vladimir Klyuev and Douglas Laxton (2008). “Why is Canada’s Price Level So Predictable?” IMF Working Paper No.08/25. King, Mervyn A. (1999). “Challenges for Monetary Policy”, in New Challenges for Monetary Policy, 11–58. Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas: Kansas City. Levin, Andrew, Chien-Fu Lin and Chia-Shang James Chu (2002). “Unit Root Tests in Panel Data: Asymptotic and Finite-Sample Properties”, Journal of Econometrics, 108, 1–24. Meier, André. (2009). “Panacea, Curse, or Non-Event? Unconventional Monetary Policy in the United Kingdom”, IMF Working Paper No.09/163. 44  BIS Review 111/2010  Minsky, Hyman (1982). “The Financial-Instability Hypothesis: Capitalist Processes and the Behavior of the Economy” in Charles Kindleberger and Jean-Pierre Laffargue (eds. ), Financial Crises. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge. Neely, Christopher J. (2010). “The Large Scale Asset Purchases had Large International Effects”, Federal Reserve Bank of St.Louis Working Paper No.2010-018A. Obstfeld, Maurice, and Kenneth S. Rogoff (2009). “Global Imbalances and the Financial Crisis: Products of Common Causes”, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco Asia Economic policy Conference, 18–20 October. Oda, Nobuyuki, and Kazuo Ueda (2005).

Corporate bond yields also fell, with investment-grade bonds declining 70 basis points and non-investment grade bonds declining 150 basis points, while the sterling exchange rate depreciated by about 4 per cent. For the United States, Gagnon et al. (2010) adopt a similar approach. They find that, across the relevant set of eight announcements, the Federal Reserve’s purchases of Treasuries and Agency debt/MBS resulted in total falls of 90 basis points in the 10-year Treasury yield, 160 points in the 10-year agency debt yield and 110 basis points in the agency MBS yield. Baa corporate bond yields also fell, by a total of 70 basis points. The size of these effects is broadly comparable to those found for the United Kingdom by Joyce et al. Neely (2010) provides some further evidence, this time relating to the international impact of the Federal Reserve’s large scale asset purchases. He finds that yields on Australian, Canadian, German, Japanese and UK 10-year bonds fell by an average of 45 basis points over the same set of announcements, while the dollar depreciated by 5 per cent. That points to considerable international spillovers from such asset purchases. The bottom line from these studies is the clear indication that asset purchases can be an effective monetary instrument. But should such unconventional policies also be part of the regular central bank toolkit in normal times? At first blush, there seems no reason why they should not.
However, we assume that households will spread consumption over time so that the savings ratio will continue to fall in spite of an increase in interest rates. Growth in housing investment is expected to ease through 2005. However, the projection for housing starts is also very high for 2005. Such a high level of housing starts over several years probably means that more dwellings will be constructed than implied by underlying demand. As a result, housing investment is expected to decline after a period. Higher interest rates and weaker developments in the Norwegian economy may also lead to a fall in residential construction after a period. The upturn in mainland fixed investment is broadly based. Stronger profitability, higher capacity utilisation and solid export growth will contribute to continued investment growth in goods-producing industries. Demand for services is expected to continue to grow for a period ahead with an attendant  BIS Review 18/2005  5  increase in investment in service sectors. When growth in the economy gradually slows down, investment growth will probably slacken. Mainland exports of good and services from mainland Norway will also benefit from solid global growth this year. Later in the period, a continued loss of market shares as a result of high cost levels will dampen export growth. Unemployment is expected to decline this year and next. In subsequent years, growth in demand and output is expected to ease, and unemployment may edge up again when capacity utilisation approaches a more normal level.

It takes a long view to recognise returns beyond profits where social and environmental gains are also equally valued. This will represent a major paradigm shift in many institutions. For this, strong and visionary leadership that sets the tone from the top, starting from the board and senior management, is certainly crucial. Far-sighted leadership to transform culture, systems and people will be central to this paradigm shift. To facilitate the process, the recently issued Strategy Paper on VBI will be complemented with an implementation guidance that is currently being developed by the Bank in collaboration with the industry. Second, VBI will require greater stakeholder activism through increased transparency on its adoption. This is a new initiative and it is imperative that our efforts go hand in hand with creating greater awareness and understanding of key stakeholders. The public sector and advocacy groups play an important role. But customers and business ventures should also play their roles wisely and use the power of their wallets to make informed choices. To catalyse this change, a value-based scorecard will be introduced to realign behaviours and expectations towards the desire to impact the community and the environment in a positive way. The scorecard will capture important dimensions of qualitative performance that are geared towards creating sustainable outcomes by Islamic financial institutions. The third critical area is adopting a collaborative approach to implementing VBI which will be key to mobilising change.
In the local context, observing our own inclusion profile, the data indicate visible improvement over the years, yet significant gaps towards, for instance, the euro area as an anchor, are still visible. The percentage of adults holding an account rose (between 2011 and 2017) to 77%, but it is still well below the euro area average of 95%. The percentage of adults making online payments equals 20%, compared to 71% in the euro area, debit cardholders account for 53% of the adult population and 87% in the euro area. Hence, the need for convergence in financial inclusion, among others, by lifting the financial literacy and awareness is apparent. While globally there are visible strivings to enhance the “conventional” financial education, the rapid penetration of information technology in the overall spectrum of financial services does stress the urgent need for digital financial literacy as a critical dimension of the overall education. Digital Financial Services are acknowledged as an opportunity to deepen financial inclusion and expand access to financial system for previously underserved groups. There are several dimensions in this area, that all of us as stakeholders should be aware of in order to provide for an ecosystem with balanced opportunities and threats. The first dimension is the knowledge of digital financial products and services in the area of payments, asset management or alternative finance.

584–596; and Samuelson, P. (1964). “Theoretical notes on trade problems,” Review of Economics and Statistics 46, pp. 145–154. For an application to the euro area, see: Honohan, P. and P.R. Lane (2003). “Divergent inflation rates in the euro area,” Economic Policy 37, pp.359-94. 2  See: Bayoumi, T. and B. Eichengreen (1992). “Shocking aspects of European Monetary Unification,” NBER working paper no. 3949; Obstfeld, M. and G. Peri (1999), “Regional nonadjustment and fiscal policy: Lessons for EMU,” NBER Working Paper No 6431. 3  An analysis of this issue made prior to the introduction of the euro is offered by: Dornbusch, R., C.A. Favero and F. Giavazzi (1998). “Immediate challenges for the ECB: Issues in formulating a single monetary policy,” Economic Policy 26, pp. 25–64. BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  recent years has been driven by differences in the impact and diffusion of a common shock, namely the financial crisis. The crisis has been a global shock that affected all countries in the euro area – and others, of course. It started with the emergence of market tensions in mid-2007 associated with uncertainty about the valuation of US mortgage-backed securities and escalated sharply in September 2008 with the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers. The varying impact of this shock on financial conditions across countries has led to a potential for dramatically different transmission of the single monetary policy stance determined by the ECB’s Governing Council.
The positive impact of this measure supplements and has been reinforced by other decisions taken by the various economic authorities, which, as I have said, have released a large part of the macroprudential buffers and have mitigated the impact of the pandemic on banks’ income statements. To date, the potentially negative side effects of these measures have been limited. Although the cost of capital for banks rose substantially with the onset of the pandemic, following the implementation of the broad raft of measures introduced to mitigate its impact this increase has been fully corrected. In addition, the recommendation to limit dividend payouts does not appear to have had a significant effect, at least in most European banking systems. 1  Another question that hampers the use of capital buffers by banks is that, under the current regulations, if capital levels fall below certain thresholds, preventive measures are activated, such as bans on dividends and the suspension of interest payments on AT1 and T2 instruments. Once again, banks would suffer the consequent stigma on the markets where these instruments are issued. 4  At the end of December, the ECB and the European Systemic Risk Board reviewed the recommendation. Given the continuing uncertainty about the economic impact of the pandemic, we have recommended that banks act with extreme prudence and that they refrain from paying cash dividends and conducting share buy-backs, or that they limit such distributions until 30 September 2021.

2  BIS central bankers’ speeches
The euro area is by far our largest trading partner – accounting for getting on for half our exports – and those direct links are supplemented by close financial ties between our domestic banking system and the continent. So it is hardly surprising that recent Inflation Reports have singled out developments in the euro area as a key risk to the UK outlook. Although the euro area has been in rough current account balance since the introduction of the euro, there have of course been substantial intra-zonal imbalances. In the run up to the crisis, periphery countries ran persistent current account deficits financed in large part by borrowing from core countries, especially Germany. As a result, the net international investment position of Spain has deteriorated by around 60% of (annual) GDP since 2000, while for Greece and Portugal the number rises to around three quarters of GDP (Chart 3). On the other side, Germany’s net international investment position has improved by around 40% of GDP. Initially these imbalances were seen as the benign consequence of an underdeveloped periphery catching up with a richer core. But on top of that were less benign influences. First, perceptions of supply potential in the periphery appear to have been over-optimistic; subsequent revisions to the IMF's estimates of spare capacity bear witness to that (Chart 4).

Chart 12: Real effective exchange rates(a)  United Kingdom Japan  Indices: January 2007 = 100 140 Euro area 130  United States China  120 110 100 90 80 70 60 2007  2008  2009  2010  2011  2012  2013  Source: Bank for International Settlements. (a) Deflated using consumer price indices. 12  BIS central bankers’ speeches
This is precisely why it is the job of the authorities to “take away the punchbowl as the party gets going”. I just cannot see how we could calibrate ex ante rules for the increase in capital requirements or whatever that would be needed to do that, but we would of course need somehow to find a way of sensibly constraining the discretion at the core of the alternative approach. Even if we could resolve all those issues, a fifth big issue is how far individual national authorities would be able to operate in this field on their own, given free flows of capital internationally and cross-border banking. These big questions are, of course, inter-related. Most obviously, how far we could get in designing an instrument(s) and a process for its deployment will affect whether the objective should be to ameliorate the effects of economic shocks on the banks or also the effects of the credit-creation process on the economy. And the objective will have a bearing on whether it is host or home authorities who need to constrain a bank’s lending growth. That is a formidable agenda, and it underlines just how much there is to do. Macroprudential: markets and infrastructure as part of the transmission mechanism But if we are to deliver and maintain stability, a macroprudential agenda cannot focus only on countercyclical capital (or margin) requirements. We need to focus on how large shocks might be transmitted through the financial system. Again, there is an analogy with monetary policy.

These were exactly the challenges faced by the Bank in articulating the terms of its Discount Window Facility. But the challenges are even greater in this area because the exit strategy from capital injections is so much more difficult; by potentially delivering control, capital-insurance is much more closely intertwined with issues of management; and because there would have to be clarity about treatment of all parts of the capital structure. I think that articulating and sticking to policies in this area will be one of the great challenges over the coming years and decades. Macroprudential: taming the credit cycle It would all be a lot easier if we could tame the credit cycle. This is the debate about the missing “macroprudential instrument”. What would be the objective; is there in principle an instrument; would it work in practice in a world of free capital flows? Those debates are prior to questions of institutional responsibility. And they have a bearing on the parallel debate about the regulatory boundary, which is where I will begin. I start from the position that excessive leverage and maturity transformation in parts of the non-bank financial sector – funds, conduits, securities dealers, and so on – was predicated on the availability of plentiful credit on too-easy terms from the commercial banking system. Up to a point, the same goes for liquidity in asset markets.