samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
In the crisis, estimates of this rate were deeply into negative territory, which is why the MPC cut Bank Rate to 0.5% and launched quantitative easing (QE). The MPC’s asset purchases can be thought of as equivalent to reducing the level of Bank Rate, since both policies provide stimulus to activity and boost inflation. If you adjust real Bank Rate to factor in the effects of QE, the resulting, “adjusted”, rate is probably below zero at present.7 Our latest forecast is consistent with the natural rate and adjusted Bank Rate recovering slowly. But it is very much part of our thinking that the  5  See Nickell, S, and Saleheen, J. (2015) “The impact of immigration on occupational wages: evidence from Britain”, Bank of England Staff Working Paper No.574. 6  The GDP projections in the February 2016 forecast include a downside skew, reflecting the possibility that global activity and, in particular, growth in emerging economies may disappoint. 7  The adjusted measure of Bank Rate is calculated by comparing the estimated effects of QE with those for a cut in Bank Rate, and using that to convert the MPC’s asset purchases into an equivalent change in Bank Rate. Expected inflation is also subtracted from the adjusted rate to convert it from a nominal to a real rate and so make it comparable to the estimates of the natural rate of interest discussed in the text.

Emerging market economies now account for more than half of global GDP and they accounted for more than 95% of world economic growth between 2008Q1 and 2011Q4.4 They are now facing a set of inter-related challenges, including high and growing levels of debt to GDP, slowing economic growth, falls in commodity prices which has hit commodity exporters and a strong US dollar. The healing process How should we read this picture? Is it still slow healing, just slower and hit by more adverse events than we expected? Or, like our friend the frog, has the gradual nature of the drift down in prospects and the fact that the deflationary shock looks so clearly to have been externally generated lulled us into missing some more fundamental shift? Is the water around us much colder than we thought? I think there is still some mileage in the slow healing story to explain the drift down in UK growth and the failure of pay and productivity to recover. One cannot repair quickly the damage to the global economy from the worst international financial crisis for 80 years. Some, but not all, of the effects of the financial bust and deep recession have passed. But some have not. I want to look now at some of these effects and headwinds that may be holding us back. First, there are signs that there may still be some scarring effects in the labour market.
Experience has shown that phases of a weaker Swiss franc can be followed by periods in which the franc exhibits an upward trend. Financial market players and businesses should therefore be aware of the exchange rate risks they take. Monetary policy decision The inflation outlook forms the basis for the monetary policy decision. How does this look to us? As has already been pointed out in the considerations on the economic situation, there is likely to be an above-average utilisation of economic resources. The monetary analysis shows that lending is still growing vigorously and that the Swiss franc is trending relatively lower against the euro. Yet the inflation outlook remains favourable. The reasons are three-fold: First, falling oil prices will push inflation down considerably next year, at least during the first six months. Second, the opening of the labour market is making production more flexible, thereby exerting a favourable influence on inflation. Third, the National Bank lifted its interest rates at an early stage. The chief contribution of today's interest rate adjustment is to prevent resources from being over-utilised in 2007 and 2008. As a consequence, inflation is also likely to be muted in 2008 and 2009. 2  BIS Review 123/2006  Inflation forecast graph The new inflation forecast is shown in the graph as a red dashed line. It covers the time span from Q4 2006 to Q4 2009 and depicts the inflation forecast on the assumption that the interest rate remains at 2.00% during this period of time.

In effect, the single currency has removed the exchange risk between the countries of the euro area and is facilitating the standardisation of debt instruments and their management on a much larger scale. This integrating effect of the euro has been most evident in the money market, by virtue of, in particular, the establishment of the large-value payment system TARGET, made available to the banks by the European System of Central Banks. This integration has shown itself in, for example, the rapid adoption by the market of reference rates for the euro area, such as the EONIA overnight rate or the EURIBOR rate for maturities of less than one year. Above all, we have seen a total convergence in short-term interest rates within the euro area. In the bond markets, the integration of the markets remains incomplete, owing to: national differences relating to property rights over securities; taxation, accounting and supervisory regulations; and payment systems (which are also hindering the integration of the short-term securities markets and repo markets). The integration of the bond markets is nonetheless progressing. First, we have seen European bond indexes become standardised. Second, the differences in rates between sovereign issues within the euro area fell substantially in 1998. Furthermore, 1999 was characterised by a spectacular growth in euro bonds issued by private non-financial firms (a threefold increase, over the first ten months, compared with the same period in 1998), and an increasing share of bonds being issued by small and low-rated companies.
It is not conceptually simple to design such an instrument as it should not, among many other complexities, compensate for weaknesses that can and should be addressed by policies and reforms. It is not legally simple because such an instrument should be consistent with the Treaty. And, as we have seen from our longstanding discussions, it is certainly not politically simple, regardless of the shape that such an instrument could take: from the provision of supranational public goods – like security, defence or migration – to a fully-fledged fiscal capacity. But the argument whereby risk-sharing may help to greatly reduce risk, or whereby solidarity, in some specific circumstances, contributes to efficient risk-reduction, is compelling in this case as well, and our work on the design and proper timeframe for such an instrument should continue. This year the ECB is celebrating its 20th birthday, and next year we will be able to mark twenty years of the euro. In those two decades the euro has become a feature of our lives and a symbol of our European identity. Three-quarters of euro area citizens now support the single currency. 30 And when people are asked to name the most important elements of European identity, the euro is the second element cited, after the values of democracy and freedom.31 The people of Europe have come to know the euro and trust the euro. But they also expect the euro to deliver the stability and prosperity it promised.

In 2012, spreads vis-à-vis German ten-year government bonds reached 500 basis points in Italy and 600 basis points in Spain, with even wider spreads in Greece, Portugal and Ireland. The fifth stage of the crisis then followed: the breakdown in monetary policy transmission across the euro area. Interest rates faced by firms and households in vulnerable countries became 2/9  BIS central bankers' speeches  increasingly divorced from short-term central bank rates. As those economies represented a third of euro area GDP, this posed a profound threat to price stability. The ECB responded with its announcement of Outright Monetary Transactions (OMTs), which restored confidence in sovereign bond markets, helped to repair the monetary policy transmission mechanism, and broke the downward spiral. With less of a direct market impact, but fundamental in confirming to the world the strength of our leaders’ commitment to the euro, was the earlier decision to create the banking union and the European Stability Mechanism (ESM). The long trip back to growth had begun. The unfolding of the euro area crisis yielded lessons for the financial sector, for individual countries and for the union as a whole. But the unifying theme was the inability of each of these actors to effectively absorb shocks. In some cases, because of their weaknesses, they even amplified those shocks. Indeed, banks fuelled the build-up of imbalances and then exacerbated the resulting crash. Countries had too low growth potential, limited flexibility to bounce back from the crisis and too little fiscal space to stabilise their economies.
No, I believe that if one really aims at exchange rates that are irrevocably fixed, then one should move all the way, that is go for monetary union. As long as two currencies are distinguishable, their relative price might change. So the choice is between flexible exchange rates and monetary union. Needless to say, since Switzerland is not a member of the European Union, joining the eurozone is not an option worth discussing at this stage. Fixing the franc against the euro would not even be a second best. It would rather be the worst of all worlds by suppressing our monetary independence, and, at the same time, exposing us to all the dangers of speculative attacks by setting us up, the back against the wall, alone against the market. 3. Our post-euro experience  What has happened since January 1, 1999, all in all, has proven very reassuring. Our worst fears have not materialized, and indeed, in some ways, the outcome has been even much more favourable than we could have hoped for. First, let me briefly sum up our experience with regard to the fears of “euroization” and of the loss of our monetary degree of freedom. As expected, the Swiss franc was not crowded out by the euro. Sure, the euro circulates in Switzerland, just like the Swiss franc circulates in neighbouring France and Germany, but the phenomenon remains marginal, and it does not exceed the use of the French francs, German marks and Italian liras in the pre-euro world.

There were several episodes when the internal stability of the dollar was threatened as well, with U.S. inflation rates in the double digits. The flight into more stable currencies put considerable pressure on these. BIS Review 35/2004  3  Today, the arrival of the euro has changed the landscape in some important respects. First, as the new kid on the block, the euro commands attention and respect. In economic size, the eurozone nearly rivals the United States. There is now an obvious alternative to the dollar as an instrument of portfolio diversification. If investors have doubts about the dollar, there is no longer any need to rush into the Swiss franc, the euro will do just fine. Second, the eurozone, although not quite to the extent of the United States, is a largely closed economy. Movements in the euro are far less devastating than movements of similar magnitude in the Swiss franc or in the German mark. The euro is much more capable than any other currency to take on the role of shock absorber against the U.S. dollar. The eurozone, in some ways, is the large closed economy that the world needed as the counterweight to the U.S. economy. All small open economies, like Switzerland, should benefit from this new international monetary order. There is a third reason why the arrival of the euro has changed the landscape and should fundamentally prove beneficial to the stability of the international monetary system, and that is competition.
Caleb M Fundanga: Framework of cooperation between the Bank of Zambia and the University of Zambia Opening remarks by Mr Caleb M Fundanga, Governor of the Bank of Zambia, at the signing ceremony of the Memorandum of Understanding between the Bank of Zambia and the University of Zambia, Lusaka, 30 June 2010. *  *  *  The Vice Chancellor, University of Zambia – Prof. Stephen Simukanga The Deputy Governor – Administration and University Council Chairperson – Dr Tukiya Kankasa-Mabula Distinguished Professors and Lecturers from UNZA Colleagues from the Bank Members of the Press Distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen; It gives me great delight, on behalf of the Bank of Zambia, to welcome you all to this important signing ceremony of the Memorandum of Understanding between the Bank of Zambia and the University of Zambia. The MoU that we are about to sign today provides a framework for the support to the Economics Department and Research activities in the Department. Ladies and Gentlemen; the Bank of Zambia continues to view the University of Zambia and the Copperbelt University as strategic partners in the economic development of Zambia. It is for this reason that the Bank has for several years now been involved in the support of various capacity building programmes at the two tertiary learning institutions.

This support has taken various forms, including the following:   Salary supplementation to fifteen (15) academic staff in the Department of Economics at UNZA and nineteen (19) academic staff in the School of Business at the Copperbelt University (CBU);    Full sponsorship of five undergraduate students at third and fourth year level at CBU and five students at Masters Degree level at UNZA;    Financial support in the acquisition of books and periodicals;    Purchase of equipment such as computers and computer software. The Bank of Zambia acknowledges the various efforts being made by the University to improve its infrastructure and the delivery of quality university education and research. We are also mindful of the various funding constraints faced by the University as it expands its programmes to meet the ever increasing demand for its services. The Bank is therefore, proud to respond to the University’s call for partnership with industry and other stakeholders in order to realise its noble objectives that cannot presently be fully funded from public resources and students fees. In this regard, the Bank of Zambia has seen it fit to not only extend this support, but to also streamline and enhance it in order to better align this support with strategic objectives of both the Bank and the University. Ladies and Gentlemen; as you are aware, the Bank of Zambia has been providing financial support for the purpose of promoting scholarly and academic excellence in research and instruction at the University of Zambia.
The FLS contributed to a substantial fall in bank funding costs after it was launched in July 2012. This fed through to a significant improvement in household credit conditions. Rates on new household lending have fallen markedly since mid-2012, with falls of more than 100 basis points in some representative mortgage rates. Both gross secured lending and repayments have picked up strongly. And the number of approvals for house purchase has risen significantly, indicating higher mortgage lending in future. The Scheme has probably been one of the driving influences behind the resurgence of business and consumer confidence – although there are many other factors behind the sort of swing we have seen. Partly because of its own success, there is no longer a need for the FLS to provide broad support to household lending. It is not the case that net lending for mortgages by UK banks is, as yet, excessive. Indeed, the annual rate of growth in the stock of secured lending to individuals was under 1% in November 2013. But sharply rising house prices are a potential source of instability and we should not risk adding policy oil to that particular fire. Credit conditions for smaller businesses have also improved, but to a lesser extent, and lending to businesses overall remains muted. The FLS extension will therefore provide continued substantial support for lending to businesses, with incentives in the scheme skewed heavily towards lending to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

Both banks have also been able to improve their leverage ratios considerably; yet in an international comparison based on a number of commonly used definitions, they are still below the average of large global banks. As my colleague Thomas Jordan has explained, economic and financial conditions for the Swiss banking sector continue to be challenging. For this reason, it is vital for the big banks to continue improving their capitalisation, and in turn their resilience, particularly as regards the leverage ratio. This is especially important because the leverage ratio is growing in significance as a measure of bank resilience. In times of crisis, in particular, the leverage ratio often becomes the focus of market attention. In the SNB’s view, the top priority for the big banks is the consistent and rapid implementation of the “too big to fail” (TBTF) regulations. The focus should be on the following areas: First, the credibility of risk-weighted asset calculations based on banks’ internal models should be strengthened. As outlined previously, risk-weighted ratios yield a different picture of a bank’s capital situation than leverage ratios. In this context, the SNB is currently supporting FINMA in an examination of whether and to what extent risk-weighted assets based on banks’ internal models differ from those based on the standard approach, which is model-independent. If this examination reveals no substantial inexplicable differences, this would strengthen market confidence in the model-based approach. Conversely, if there are any substantial differences that cannot be explained, corrective measures would need to be considered and implemented.
Asia’s transition to sustainability has to be progressive yet determined – through ever deeper shades of green. There is considerable scope to make Asian cities greener and cleaner – by tapping on energy-eﬀicient technologies and renewable energy solutions. Asia is also well-positioned to reap the vast potential of renewable energy. Large-scale solar farms have already become a common sight in Asia. According to the International Renewable Energy Agency, Asia is poised to become a world leader in wind energy by 2050. https://www.mas.gov.sg/news/speeches/2020/harnessing-the-power-of-finance-for-a-sustainable-future  2/13  14/10/2020  “Harnessing the Power of Finance for a Sustainable Future”- Keynote Speech by Mr Ravi Menon, Managing Director, MAS, at the Finan…  A progressive transition to a low-carbon economy is consistent with inclusive economic growth. According to the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate, bold climate action could generate more than 65 million new low-carbon jobs globally in 2030. [2] Renewable energy projects, energy-eﬀicient retrofits, and green construction are labour intensive in the short run and a good means of creating jobs. [3] SUSTAINABLE SINGAPORE  Singapore has much at stake in global eﬀorts to mitigate climate risk. We are a tropical island smaller in size than London, with most of the country lying just 15 metres above sea level. If temperatures were to soar or sea levels rise, our very existence could be in question. Singapore has always been committed to the idea of sustainability. Right from the 1960s, as a newly independent developing country, we pursued sustainable development: economic growth with environmental protection and social inclusion.

The Centre will also groom a pipeline of talent in green finance across the career spectrum— from the undergraduate to the executive education levels. The Centre has strong support from our financial industry, which will play a key role in steering the Centre’s focus towards market-oriented outputs. I would like to thank the founding partners— Bank of China Limited, BNP Paribas, Fullerton Fund Management, Goldman Sachs, HSBC, Schroders, Standard Chartered Bank, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, and UBS AG. MAS will continue to promote a vibrant green finance research and talent development ecosystem. We will look to anchor more centres of excellence with diﬀerent strengths and focus areas — to provide a diversified pool of research and talent in green finance. CONCLUSION People across the world – and in Singapore – are increasingly concerned about climate change and environmental degradation. And they want to do something about it. Climate change is becoming a rallying cry to inspire people to step up to a higher cause, to take collective action for the common good of our planet. The looming climate crisis poses not just an existential challenge to be overcome but also an economic opportunity to be seized. The coming revolution in sustainability has the potential to remake the world, cleaner and greener, creating new value and new jobs. Let us harness the power of finance to help create such a world, and a sustainable future.
On 9 March 2009 the Federal Reserve published the results of a comprehensive stress testing of US banks. In retrospect, it appears that a better overview reduced uncertainty in financial markets. International equity markets then rebounded for a period and premiums were reduced. Up to last autumn, there was little concern in the markets as to governments’ ability to finance fiscal deficits and service debt. In late autumn last year, the crisis entered its latest phase so far, and the situation in Greece was a subject of growing concern. The fiscal deficit was considerably larger than previously reported and announced. Reports also indicated errors in government debt figures. Ireland had already implemented tightening measures and was therefore in a better position. Recently, uncertainty concerning the economic situation in Greece has spread to other southern European countries. European money, bond and foreign exchange markets have also been affected. Equity markets have fallen sharply. On 2 May, Greece, the IMF and the euro area countries reached an agreement to provide a total of EUR 110 billion in loans to Greece. Greece has presented an economic programme to stabilise and then reduce government debt and to boost growth potential. However, the loan was not sufficient to quell market unrest. On the contrary, premiums rose. The governments of several other countries were in danger of not being able to pay their bills.

BIS Review 69/2010  3  At a crisis meeting on 8–9 May, EU finance ministers therefore agreed on a EUR 500 billion European Financial Stabilisation mechanism to support countries unable to borrow in the market. The largest portion will be provided through loans guaranteed by individual euro area countries. The IMF will provide support in the form of loans upon application from an individual country, perhaps up to a total of EUR 250 billion. Several countries announced sharper spending cuts. The ECB will buy government and other bonds and offer extra loans to banks to promote the smooth functioning of markets. Moreover, the Federal Reserve has entered into agreements with other central banks to re-establish temporary dollar swap facilities to avoid failure in dollar funding markets. 3. Norwegian economy  To mitigate the effects of the financial crisis, central bank key rates were cut sharply in 2008 and are still close to zero in a number of countries. The key policy rate in Norway was also reduced from autumn 2008. Norges Bank also implemented a number of extraordinary measures to improve credit flows. Banks were provided with longer-term liquidity and direct access to US dollar liquidity, and collateral requirements for loans from Norges Bank were relaxed. On the advice of Norges Bank and a proposal from the Ministry of Finance, the Storting decided that banks would be entitled to exchange covered bonds for government securities.