samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
In our baseline scenario for the global economy, we expect growth in the coming quarters to remain in line with potential. In the advanced economies, expansionary monetary policy is lending support, as is fiscal policy in some countries. Inflationary pressure is likely to remain moderate. The risks to this baseline scenario for the global economy are still to the downside. However, they are more pronounced than at our previous monetary policy assessment. Chief among them are political uncertainty and trade tensions, which could lead to renewed turbulence on the financial markets and a further dampening of economic sentiment. Swiss economic outlook  I shall now turn to the economic outlook for Switzerland. The Swiss economy also gathered momentum at the beginning of the year. According to the initial estimate, GDP grew by 2.3% in the first quarter. Growth was broad-based across the different sectors of the economy. Labour market developments were also positive. Employment figures continued to rise, and the unemployment rate remained stable at a low level. Production capacity in Switzerland was well utilised overall. As regards the developments in the second quarter and the months thereafter, the surveys and leading indicators are currently presenting a mixed picture. All in all, however, they point towards momentum remaining favourable. Even in manufacturing, which is likely to be affected most directly by weaker industrial activity, expectations are that the business situation will continue to improve. Companies’ plans regarding capital spending and recruitment also remain positive, which offers further grounds for confidence.

We expect to implement the risk-based capital frameworks for life and general insurance companies in the third quarter of 2004. BIS Review 43/2004  1  III  Enhancing market discipline  On enhancing market discipline, we began inspection for compliance with the Financial Advisers Act (FAA) last year. We noted a number of best practices during these inspections and have published them in a paper. To alert investors here, we intend to publish a list of unlicensed entities based outside Singapore who are suspected of conducting activities regulated under the Securities and Futures Act and/or FAA. Details will be released by the end of the week. To help consumers become more self-reliant in their financial affairs, MAS has worked with other public sector agencies to launch MoneySENSE, a national financial education programme, in October 2003. In the next few months, MoneySENSE will conduct a national financial literacy survey to benchmark the current level of financial literacy among Singaporeans. We are also facilitating the development of an integrated dispute resolution scheme for the financial sector. IV  Developing the financial sector  On the developmental front, the wealth management industry grew considerably, both in institutional asset management and private banking. Financial institutions enjoyed fresh inflows of funds as well as substantial appreciation in the value of their assets under management. The alternative asset management industry also saw good growth, with the entry of hedge fund managers.
Making greater use of simple, prudent regulatory metrics could restore faith, hope and clarity to the financial system to the benefit of banks, investors and regulators alike. 10  BIS central bankers’ speeches  Chart 1: Average risk weights(a)  Chart 2: Average risk weights and leverage(a)(b)  80 Per cent  80  70  70  60  60  50  50  40  40  30  30  20  20  10  Per Cent  94 96 98 00 02 04 06 08 10  35 30 25 20 15 10  Weighted average RW Weighted average leverage (RHS)  10  0  Leverage ratio  5 0  0 94  96  98  00  02  04  06  08  10  Source: The Banker and Bank calculations. (a) Weighted average risk weights of Deutsche Bank, HSBC, BNP Paribas, Barclays, Citigroup, UBS, BAML, BONY, Commerzbank, ING, JPM, LBG, RBS, Santander, State Street, UniCredit, Wells Fargo. Data are not available for the remaining G-SIBs. Source: The Banker and Bank calculations (a) Sample consists of Deutsche Bank, HSBC, BNP Paribas, Barclays, Citigroup, UBS, BAML, BONY, Commerzbank, ING, JPM, LBG, RBS, Santander, State Street, UniCredit, Wells Fargo. Data are not available for the remaining G-SIBs. (b) Leverage ratio is defined as Total assets / Tier 1 capital.

As elsewhere, a regulatory regime of constrained discretion has given way to one with too much unconstrained indiscretion. This calls for regulatory repair. Without change, the current regulatory system risks suffering, like the Chicago teachers and the LIBOR fixers, reputational damage. Fortunately, there are early signs that regulatory change is afoot to place tighter constraints on this (in)discretion. The emergence of self-regulation To understand how we ended up here, it is useful to explore the historical contours of the regulatory debate. This is a history in roughly four chapters. Chapter 1 covers the period prior to the agreement of the first Basel Accord in 1988. Until then, a patchwork of national regulatory frameworks for capital adequacy operated. Some countries set capital adequacy standards based on simple measures of bank equity to assets – a leverage ratio. Others, including in the US, used risk-based standards with risk weights set by regulators for a small set of asset categories. Chapter 2 begins with the introduction of the Basel Accord. This was a landmark agreement: the first-ever genuinely international banking accord, based around an 8% bank capital ratio, with internationally-set risk-weights applied to a small set of banks’ assets. The Accord was explicitly designed to lean against an international “race to the bottom” in capital adequacy standards (Goodhart (2011)). It also helped ensure a level international playing field. Chapter 3 commences with the Market Risk Amendment to Basel I in 1996 and continues through to the Basel II agreement of 2004.
Here, the theory of risk transfer was that risk would be reallocated to those most able to bear it. In practice, though, those most willing to take these risks have in some cases turned out to be those who understood the risks the least and thus were prepared to take it on at too low a price. This problem is extremely hard to guard against because of the difficulty in determining whether a counterparty who is insuring you against risk (or a chain of counterparties) fully understands what they have taken on and have the capacity to make good on their commitment in adverse states of the world. In recent months, banks have been forced to write down the value of contracts that they had bought from monoline insurers to guarantee the payments promised by their holdings of highly-rated CDOs linked to US sub prime mortgages. With the likelihood of such guarantees being called upon appearing very small, the monolines wrote a large volume of such guarantees. But more recently, this prospect has become a distinct possibility, and one that threatens the viability of some of the monoline insurers, and thus their perceived ability to pay. Incentives 24 These information problems are difficult enough when risk is treated as exogenous. And in a world of full information, “nature” can be the only source of uncertainty.

With these measures, one needs to take into consideration the fiscal support through a broad range of Page | 4 Document Classification: Public  government measures aimed at helping households and businesses, which also indirectly sustain the banks by mitigating the effects of the crisis on bank balance sheets. The negative implications from the pandemic will continue to be felt in the near term and this is why the Central Bank encourages all financial institutions to preserve capital, while at the same time continue to lend prudently and avoid unnecessary forbearance measures. I will repeat: the banks are sufficiently liquid, with strong capital ratios and financial resources, and these, coupled with their technological infrastructure and human resources, is enabling them to meet the challenges that the pandemic presents. To conclude, although the pandemic has been around with us for some nine months, the uncertainties surrounding it are still high, although recent news of the rollout of a vaccine in the very near future have surely given hope that we are closer to the end of the pandemic. Nevertheless, its effects will not go away any time soon, and 2021 will be a challenging year, both from an economic perspective and for the banking sector. Therefore, both fiscal and monetary authorities will need to remain vigilant and monitor closely the situation to avoid untimely withdrawal of support measures. Finally allow me a footnote. I would have welcomed this opportunity to say something about Brexit.
20 In March 2016, the China Internet Finance Association was established in Shanghai by the People’s Bank of  China. This is the highest-level national self-regulatory organisation for the burgeoning internet finance sector in China. 21 3 of the top 5 FinTech companies globally (ranked by FinTech Innovators) are based in or near Shanghai. Top-  ranked Ant Financial is based in Hangzhou, while 4th ranked Lu.com and 5th ranked ZhongAn Insurance are based in Shanghai itself. 22 For example, one strategic thrust is to help businesses digitise their processes and integrate them with electronic  payments solutions, so as to maximise productivity and efficiency gains. 23 Based on Deloitte’s report released in September 2016 titled “Connecting Global FinTech: Hub Review 2016”. 6/7  BIS central bankers' speeches  7/7  BIS central bankers' speeches

While improving understanding is crucial, it also needs to be complemented with concrete actions that would improve the effectiveness of preventive and enforcement actions. For example, this could be done by incorporating and overlaying these insights into the transaction monitoring process and customer profiling. The implementation of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) recommendations will allow more effective actions to be undertaken. Both aspects of compliance, that is, technical and effectiveness, are equally important. The philosophy behind the intended outcomes is the integrated manner in which countries should combat financial crimes. This would require cooperation from all parties involved and encompass the whole eco-system of combating financial crime: investigation, prosecution, conviction and confiscation. No stone should be left unturned. FATF in its 2015 evaluation, recognised Malaysia as having high technical compliance but called on Malaysia to ensure greater effectiveness in producing the desired outcomes of our system especially in the area of investigation, prosecution, and forfeiture of laundered properties. Understanding of new and emerging risks and having a comprehensive toolkit  2/5  BIS central bankers' speeches  My second point is the need to have a deep understanding of new and emerging risks and a comprehensive toolkit to effectively execute our shared responsibility to eradicate financial crime. All of you may have heard this many times, but it is worth restating that the rapid advancement in technology is a major running story for our age. While this presents wonderful opportunities for economic development, it also creates attendant risks and fresh set of challenges.
These include crimes such as trafficking in drugs, women and children, as well as trading of illegal weapons. But there are more subtle forms of economic crime where authorities find it difficult to agree on the risks. In such cases, cooperation in combating such crimes would be more difficult. Examples of such cases are when bigger nations exploit the natural resources of smaller nations, which have been a practice for over 100 years since the days of colonization. Modern fortes of such crimes can be seen in cases where influential businessmen from large countries move into smaller countries under the pretext of technological advancement to exploit the latter's natural resources, which often are claimed for the mutual benefits of both parties. But it is clear that the allocation of such benefits is often not balanced. There is also a case of exploitation of consumers in smaller nations when products which are hazardous to health in bigger nations, have been relocated for production and sale in less developed nations. An example of this is tobaccos and cigarettes, which come under stringent restrictions on sales and advertisement in bigger nations but have been sold in other nations with highly persuasive but subtle advertisement campaigns aimed at teenagers and women. There are also cases of certain medicines which have been banned in more developed markets and yet can still be found on the shelves of other less developed markets. There is no way for the authorities of two nations to agree that such dubious practices constitute economic crimes.

But it is clear that they are exploitation of smaller countries by bigger nations with more economic clout and technological advancement. These practices still continue to the detriment of the public in smaller nations. Such resentment comes not from the physical harm or destruction of personal properties, but from the feeling that they are living in an unjust world, where the rules favour big nations at the cost of smaller nations. I do not have any solution to this problem, and I do not foresee any elected leader, whose rise to office have been supported by influential business sectors, to make a move on this issue. I only hope that an internationally neutral body such as the United Nations which is the hope and voice of all nations, big and small, would look at the issue of economic exploitation of bigger nation on smaller nations and set appropriate rules of the game to protect the interests of smaller nations. This would help people feel that they are living in a just and fair world. Thank you for your attention. 2  BIS Review 29/2005
For instance, in the UK the Bank of England reports to the Treasury if inflation deviates by more than 1 percentage point from the inflation target of 2½%. Other inflation targeting countries have chosen various other reporting arrangements. The Norwegian system allows economic policy as a whole to focus more strongly on movements in exchange rates. The reason for this is the considerable emphasis placed on the consideration of healthy growth in the exposed sector. This in turn reflects the risk of the Norwegian economy becoming too dependent on oil. In the medium term, growth in the exposed sector is affected to a large degree by the proportion of petroleum revenues included in the Norwegian economy via the government budget. With large and to some extent varying budget revenues, the basis for determining central government expenditure and taxes from one year to the next may easily be impaired. If budget expenditure is allowed to fluctuate in step with oil prices, the result may be abrupt shifts and instability in the Norwegian economy. Changes in oil prices may then quickly influence wage and price expectations, the exchange rate and long-term rates. In that case it will be very demanding to achieve nominal stability. Short-term interest rates will have to be adjusted frequently and sharply and will generally reflect a high risk premium for the Norwegian krone. It is therefore important that the annual budgets are anchored in a long-term strategy that takes into account that oil revenues can fluctuate from one year to the next.

The interest rate differential reflects high demand growth and high wage growth. There is a clear relationship between wage growth, interest rate expectations and the krone exchange rate. The appreciation of the krone dampens inflation, and at the same time weakens profitability, employment and the capacity to cover labour costs in the internationally exposed sector. The krone can move in both directions. It will not appreciate indefinitely. Sustained lower wage growth will be accompanied by a narrower interest rate differential and it may reverse movements in the exchange rate. A declining level of wage growth would provide a strong impetus to the internationally exposed sector. The interest rate could be reduced. This would lead to a depreciation of the krone, with a further improvement in earnings and employment. Over the last thirty years, manufacturing has been scaled back in waves. There was substantial downscaling in the years from 1977 to 1984 and 1987 to 1992 in particular. In the years leading up to the periods of contraction, profitability deteriorated in the manufacturing sector. It can take time before such a deterioration translates into lower output and employment. But when the turnaround does occur, it tends to be swift and hard-hitting. It now appears that a new period of downscaling is under way. Several factors point to this: First, productivity growth is higher in manufacturing than in other industries. This has resulted in a trend decline in the numbers employed in manufacturing in Norway, as it has in other OECD countries.
In this regard, I would like to point out that market is more aware and conscious that digitalisation is the future, as a consequence of the technological revolution taking place in each field of life, in the perspective of their strategic development, in the context of minimizing the costs and risks borne by traditional practices, and at the same time for increasing the effective productivity. Without wishing to repeat the previous statements, I consider it worthily to point out that all market actors should be seen as our strategic partners, who in their own way have always 1/3  BIS central bankers' speeches  contributed to the financial inclusion and promotion of electronic payment services. Until a few years ago, paying utility bills, fines, tax payments, customs and social security via the internet and mobile seemed a utopia. Nowadays, the general public is increasingly employing and benefiting from these services. Allow me to provide some significant figures which best converge to the materialisation of this development. In 2012, about 96% of transfers were initiated in paper form at banks’ windows, while today about 50% of transfers are processed remotely. If we include in the calculations the card payments, it turns out that 79% of payments and transfers are made remotely and only 21% in bank branches. From this point of view, I deem that banks remain committed to accommodate the needs of the e-Albania platform, both in the existing conditions and after the creation of “open banking".

In looking for the origins of the crisis, one also observes instances of fiscal indiscipline, which caused problems at the Euro area level. In some member states, as for example in the case of Greece, EU funds were not put to proper use and in some cases ended up imposing a burden on future government finances. In my previous appointment at the European Court of Auditors, where I was responsible for coordinating the overall audit report on the spending of the EU budget, in almost every report  1  See L. Bini Smaghi, “Eurozone, European crisis and policy responses”, Goldman Sachs Global Macro Conference – Asia 2011, 22 February 2011. BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  during my six-year term, Greece was invariably singled out because of its problems and serious deficiencies in the spending of EU funds. Greece often had to pay back to the EU budget funds that it badly needed. It is evident that such weaknesses in the administrative and political structure put an unnecessary burden on Greece’s fiscal position. A recent study describes the first nine years of the euro, between 1999 and 2007 (that is, the pre-crisis period), as “ ‘wasted good times’ during which the foundations were laid for the present crisis … Almost as soon as the euro had been introduced, consolidation fatigue set in”.2 Moreover, governance at the EU level was weak. The application of the corrective arm of the Stability and Growth Pact was softened through intervention at the political level in 2003.
According to the forecast of Statistics Sweden, the population will only increase by around 0.1-0.2% this year and during the first decade of the 21st century. With GDP growth of 3% and a population increase of around 0.7% a year, a rough measure of productivity is obtained which shows that it has increased on average by 2.3% per year during the 20th century as a whole. Nowadays, the figure is lower; most analysts estimate that trend productivity is under rather than over 2% per year, although there has been some improvement in recent years. The standard of living has accordingly not risen as quickly during the 1990s as it did during a number of earlier decades during the century. Figure 3. GDP per capita  3. GDP per inhabitant Average annual percentage change of GDP per inhabitant in 1990 prices in US dollars 4  3  2  1  0 1820-50 1850-70  1870-90 1890-10 1910-30 1930-50  Sweden  1950-70 1970-90  UK  In order to obtain an idea of developments in Sweden we can look at the United Kingdom. Sweden is considered to have become industrialised about hundred years after the UK. GDP per capita therefore grew more quickly in Britain than in Sweden during the first half of the 19th century. From 1870 onwards, however, the relationship between the two countries changed. Growth per capita became the same in both countries and after 1890 and up to 1970, Sweden took the lead.

After all, the danger of inflation is hardly a pressing concern nowadays (but rather the lack of it) and the pursuit of financial stability is ultimately a shared responsibility, since it implies close cooperation with the government and other authorities and may ultimately involve recourse to public funding. I share Stanley Fisher’s view that it would be a costly mistake to give up central bank independence. That would mean “the benefits of having a central bank that can take a longer term and apolitical view of what is good for the economy and take actions in support of that view will be lost”. If a long-term perspective and a shield against political pressure are required for achieving price stability, these may be even more important if explicit concern for financial stability is added. And frankly, I do not see the need for close cooperation with the government as something that implies abandoning central bank independence, but rather as a pre-requisite – which has always been there – for promoting effective policies. Irrespective of how well-designed the policies of the central bank may be, they cannot substitute for a consistent macroeconomic policy mix, and in the absence of this consistency they are likely to achieve at best sub-optimal outcomes. Having said that, I think there are a few questions worth asking – I must confess I do not have the answers, but I believe that the future of central banking hinges upon them.