samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
The outbreak of the coronavirus crisis in the spring of 2020 caused enormous financial turbulence, including the biggest stock market fall in one day so far in Sweden.3 All bond rates rose to a varying extent. The new motto for investors was ‘dash for cash’, as they abandoned unsafe assets in favour of safer ones with high liquidity.4 During the crisis, the Riksbank's monetary policy focused as far as possible on maintaining interest rates at a low level and maintaining the supply of credit so that the real economy could function. A key element in our response to the crisis was extensive purchases of bonds (see Figure 2).5 The very fact that all bond yields rose to varying degrees made a broad palette of asset purchases necessary to hold interest rates at a low level. The Riksbank purchased government bonds, covered bonds, municipal bonds and corporate bonds. 6 We took framework decisions for the total asset purchases, which we then distributed over the different asset classes through regular decisions at the monetary policy meetings held. Initially, the framework was set at SEK 300 billion in March 2020 and then expanded to SEK 500 billion in June and to SEK 700 billion in November of the same year. In connection with the decisions in June and November 2020, we extended the purchases from the end of 2020 to first the middle, and then the end, of 2021.

And at our meeting in June last year we decided to use the full framework, which meant that our asset purchases ended at SEK 700 billion. Our plan was then to merely maintain the holding, by compensating for principal payments. I will return to our most recent decision later on. Broadly speaking, the Riksbank's monetary policy response followed the same pattern as the major central banks, the ECB and the Federal Reserve, as is illustrated in Table 1. This is not so strange, given that the crisis affected many countries roughly at the same time and in the same way. Figure 2 shows our holdings of securities, while Figure 3 shows how much of the outstanding stock we have purchased in each respective market. On the whole, we now own roughly the same nominal amount of government bonds as covered bonds. Nevertheless, we have bought a considerably smaller share of the outstanding stock of covered bonds compared to government securities. This says something about the size of the market for covered bonds. 3 On 12 March 2020, the index on the Stockholm Stock Exchange fell by 11 per cent. 4 See, for example, Sveriges Riksbank (2021), Cunliffe (2022) and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (2022). 5 There have also been purchases of smaller amounts of securities with shorter maturities, in the form of treas-  ury bills and commercial paper. 6 The Riksbank also implemented a number of other measures as a result of the crisis.
Rather, it encourages combining these new technologies with more traditional measures and advocates establishing a sound shared vision as a first step in the laying of the necessary foundations.10 This implies that to really achieve a profound transformation, an ambitious range of actions is required, beyond the mere operational or technical aspects, like the development of international guidelines, improvement of surveillance practices or the removal of obstacles to the exchange of data, just to name a few. Nevertheless, the importance of digital technology in this context should not be underplayed, even though its full potential may only be realised in the long run. Indeed, it is worth mentioning that a number of the enhancements foreseen as part of this action plan  7  “Enhancing Cross-border Payments: Stage 1 report to the G20”, Financial Stability Board, April 2020. [https://www.fsb.org/wp-content/uploads/P090420-1.pdf] 8  “Enhancing cross-border payments: building blocks of a global roadmap: Stage 2 report to the G20”, Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures, CPMI Papers, No 193, July 2020. [https://www.bis.org/cpmi/publ/d193.pdf] 9  See footnote 8. 10  Indeed, one such measure is devoted to the potential issuance of a CBDC/stablecoins. This underlines my key message, i.e. that emerging technologies offer us an opportunity to address old problems in novel and, eventually, more effective ways. 5  are ultimately designed to help knock down some of the existing barriers to the emergence of new cross-border payment infrastructures and arrangements. Conclusion I would like to conclude by sharing some final thoughts with you.

As such, digitalisation has once again proved to be not a goal in itself but rather a means to serve a much broader purpose, as it offers a novel toolkit to push out the boundaries of what has been possible in the past, allowing us to address well-known and often challenging problems in a convenient and much more effective manner. Exploring the pros and cons of issuing a central bank digital currency (CBDC) Since the previous panel has already covered these COVID-related themes quite extensively, I would rather use my time to draw your attention to something different and yet equally important as a reflection of the impact of digitalisation. Hence, in the next few minutes I will comment on the way in which this transformational process echoes in a specific context, namely that of a central bank in its role as service provider, and the crosscutting impact this may have on the broader ecosystem. As in other realms, the large-scale adoption of new technologies is also likely to disrupt both the environment in which we, central banks, carry out our tasks and the choices we need to make on the best possible approach to those tasks. Indeed, this is true for all central banks’ functions and responsibilities. However, to illustrate this point, I will focus primarily on one that is attracting much interest lately: our role as the sole issuer of legal tender.
6  See for example, Borio, C., Furfine, C and Lowe, P “Procyclicality of the financial system and financial stability: issues and policy options” BIS paper 1, March 2001 and BIS Annual Report: The unsustainable has run its course and policymakers face the difficult task of damage control, 30 June 2008. 7  See Box 9 – Market dynamics and options selling, pp. 60-61, Bank of England Financial Stability Review, June 2005. 10  BIS Review 93/2008  Table 1 Growth of selected financial markets (per cent) OTC derivatives (notional principal outstanding) (a) 98H1 - 07H1 07H1 - 07H2 FX forwards and swaps 8.1 18.8 FX options 11.0 8.0 Interest rate swaps 28.1 13.7 Interest rate options 23.4 8.9 (a) 05H1 - 07H1 07H1 - 07H2 Credit default swaps 17.2 36.0 Asset-backed securities (issuance) (a) (b) 98H1 - 07H1 07H1 - 07H2 07H2 - 08Q1 Non-agency RMBS 15.7 -67.4 -67.5 CMBS 25.0 -40.9 -93.8 Auto loans 7.8 -32.5 -17.1 Credit cards 6.7 -9.8 19.0 Student loans 12.0 -56.9 -34.2 Collateralised debt obligations (issuance) (a) (b) 05H1 - 07H1 07H1 - 07H2 07H2 - 08Q1 Corporate CDOs 121.0 -46.0 -92.1 CLOs 42.5 -56.9 -74.4 ABS CDOs 38.7 -68.2 -85.2 Sources: BIS, Dealogic and SIFMA. (a) Annual growth rate. (b) Growth of annualised issuance. 43 It is vital that market forces should be decisive in determining which instruments live or die.

First, in an open economy setting, higher interest rates will attract even more capital inflows to Singapore, especially given our strong macroeconomic fundamentals and persistently low foreign interest rates. This could fuel further asset price inflation. Second, the hike in interest rates would have to be very aggressive for it to dampen demand for credit, and tame asset prices. This would mean a sharp appreciation in the exchange rate, which would impose significant collateral damage on the broader economy. Indeed, some regional countries with interest rate regimes are facing the dilemma between raising rates to curb credit booms and preventing the spillovers on capital inflows and their exchange rates. On balance, a switch to a regime of managing interest rates will be highly destabilising. There are potentially unpredictable costs associated with a shift in the monetary policy regime, quite apart from its limited impact on the other broader and more predominant sources of underlying price pressures in the economy. MAS’ assessment has been corroborated by Professor Ilian Mihov, Professor of Economics at INSEAD. His pioneering academic work has demonstrated that for an open economy like Singapore, a monetary policy response based on the exchange rate delivers superior economic welfare outcomes compared to an interest rate regime. In particular, the exchange rate is better able than the interest rate to reduce volatility in output and inflation.
What the UK may lack is some diffusion spokes to accompany these innovation hubs – spokes that could help spread new and existing technologies, new products and practices to the long and lengthening lower tail of companies. To be successful, these spokes would need to be repositories of knowledge and expertise on technologies and their application to companies. And, ideally, these repositories would have regional and sectoral reach to enable them to touch the long tail. The UK’s existing university network would be one institutional solution to this spoke problem. They have regional and sectoral reach. They also have embodied expertise and knowledge. By working in partnership with local businesses, they could serve as repositories of expertise on good company practices – in management, organisation, logistics, robotics, AI and the like. A new set of business parks attached to these universities could serve, not so much as innovation incubators for new companies, but as diffusion clinics for existing ones. This idea goes with the grain of the earlier proposal; it would broaden the scope and purpose of universities. In future, these would develop a broader set of capitals – beyond human capital (in people) to include physical and intellectual capital (in firms). And they would do so throughout the lifecycle of companies, not just in their early years. As it happens, this would also be consistent with Newman’s original conception of universities as diffusion-engines, every bit as much as innovation-engines.

43  12  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches  12  Typically, the two sides of this argument are taken to be in a secular struggle: the dark forces of secular stagnation pitted against the dynamic forces of secular innovation. Yet in practice, both arguments have merit. They are certainly not mutually incompatible. It is perfectly possible to imagine a world of rapid innovation which nonetheless leaves large swathes of society in its slipstream. More than that, recent research suggests this is a likely outcome of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. There are good conceptual grounds for thinking the displacement effects of the Fourth Industrial Revolution may be larger than ever-previously. Every industrial revolution has resulted in a hollowing-out, typically of mid-skilled tasks. Historically, that has meant largely manual, labour-intensive tasks. Machine has replaced human in activities that are routine and repetitive. The future could well be very different. For example, the dawning of AI means that humans will no longer have the cognitive playing field to themselves. Thinking or non-routine tasks may increasingly be taken up by machines. They will be able to process more quickly, more cheaply and with fewer errors than their human counterpart, at least in some activities. That could make the hollowing-out of human tasks, now cognitive as well as manual, far greater than ever before. 48  A cottage industry has emerged over recent years manufacturing estimates of job loss that might result from 49  this rise of the robots.
Under these conditions, it is human nature to overemphasize positive information, tire of reform, declare victory and move on. These impulses might be expected to be particularly powerful against the backdrop of years of strong and unbroken Asian economic growth. It is no wonder therefore that governments the world over initially tend to underestimate the size of problems, underfund solutions and postpone loss recognition. It also is not surprising that, given the many obstacles involved, authorities may be tempted to prematurely mark a case closed, particularly with the advent of economic recovery. In the new international financial landscape, a government’s perceived ability to deliver on the policy front is crucial, preferably based on coherent, comprehensive and achievable objectives. Confidence in a government’s ability to deliver is nurtured both by actions and by communication. Complacency and reform backsliding, however, create the dangerous potential for a shift in expectations. Vulnerabilities Indeed, while the recovery in the region has been impressive, vulnerabilities remain, both at the micro- and macroeconomic levels. On a microeconomic level, the still fragile condition of regional financial and corporate sector institutions remains a vulnerability, and a real threat to medium-term stability. Notwithstanding significant official rescue efforts, regional financial sectors remain burdened by a high level of problem loans, and require further substantive bolstering of capital and reserves. Authorities, by and large, have yet to articulate a program for reprivatizing banks and liquidating purchased assets. Improvements in the financial system infrastructure depend critically on follow-through on these issues, a long-term process.

While the crisis did substantial damage, it has not fundamentally affected Asia’s prodigious economic strengths. But if Asia is to realize its potential, it is critical that authorities attend to the unfinished business that remains while continuing to put in place longer-term measures to promote financial resilience and sustainable growth. Asia is at an important crossroads and there is now a unique  BIS Review 57/2000  6  opportunity to consolidate recent reforms and implement lasting change that will pay dividends for years to come. Korea’s history, both longer-term and more recent, gives me every confidence that your country, assisted ably by the Bank of Korea, will rise to these challenges with skill and vigor, ensuring that the next 50 years will be even more successful than the last. Thank you for your kind invitation and attention. Supported by the miracles of modern technology, I would be happy to take any questions you may have. 7  BIS Review 57/2000
Government debt levels are being better taken into account and sanctions will become more automatic. Ideally those European disciplines should be now completed by the adoption, in each member states, of strong national fiscal rules. The second Pillar is a new process to monitor competitiveness and, in particular, unit production costs. Lastly, member states have agreed on a new euro area framework for crisis management. Experience has shown the need to provide temporary financial support to EA Member States facing impaired access to market financing, As you know, a new facility, the EFSF, was created in May 2010 for a three year period. It has been used to support and finance the Greek and Irish programs. Although nominally set at 440bn its effective lending capacity was in fact limited to 250bn, an amount which may have been insufficient to instill confidence in the markets. Last March, an agreement was reached to raise that capacity to an effective 440 bn. Member states also agreed on a permanent crisis management framework due to be implemented in 2013 and mainly based on a European Stability Mechanism (ESM) with an effective lending capacity of EUR 500 bn. That mechanism will have the possibility of  2  BIS central bankers’ speeches  exceptional interventions in sovereign debt primary markets. Identical and standardized Collective Action Clauses (CACs) will be included in all new euro area government securities, with maturity above one year, from July 2013.

It is really a great honor to have representatives from the central banks of the EU member states as well as from the candidate countries attending this conference, especially having in mind that on the last day of the conference some of them will have presentations and share their experiences in the domain of payment systems. Ladies and gentlemen, Now, allow me to declare the seventh conference on payment and securities settlement systems open! I would like to wish the chairman Mr. Michiel van Doeveren and his colleagues a successful conference. I hope the weather will be fine and you will enjoy the beauties of Lake Ohrid, and in the afternoon and in the evening, you will have the opportunity to visit the city of Ohrid, which is one of the best preserved material and spiritual legacies witnessing the millennial existence of our culture and historical heritage. BIS central bankers’ speeches  3
But the point I have tried to emphasise this morning is that it is just one important factor among a number of others affecting our financial systems, so that one should not perhaps expect that it would have had a dramatic overall impact – certainly not in so short a period of time. And my message is that there are many other things beyond the introduction of the single currency that we can and should do, whether from inside or outside the Eurozone to improve the functioning of our financial systems. Nationally, certainly within the UK, apart from continuing to try to find the right balance generally between competition and necessary regulation, we need also – through the authorities and the financial markets working together – to continue working to ensure that the financial system reaches those parts of the economy that are traditionally most difficult to get at, including particularly the encouragement of smaller and medium-sized businesses and new enterprises as well as community development and regeneration. Regionally, within Europe, as I said earlier, we need to work away at developing the single financial market, pressing on with the Financial Services Action Plan. Most immediately, in line with the Lamfalussy recommendations, we need to address some of the regulatory obstacles to greater integration of securities markets. And we need to encourage the markets to find more efficient solutions to trading, clearing and settlement systems, particularly in securities markets, but also more generally.

Philipp M Hildebrand: Ten theories on the economic relationship Switzerland Europe Summary of a speech by Dr Philipp M Hildebrand, Member of the Governing Board of the Swiss National Bank, to the Arbeitgeberverband Basel, Basel, 8 September 2004. The complete speech can be found in German on the Swiss National Bank’s website (www.snb.ch). *  *  *  The relationship between Switzerland and the EU is close in so many ways that it appears almost stronger than that among many member states themselves. The debate on a possible integration into the EU as a logical consequence should be as broad-based as possible. Economically speaking, the issue has become more pressing since the introduction of the euro, as Switzerland is now surrounded by a single-currency area. Switzerland’s weaker economic growth is also frequently quoted as an argument in favour of integration, since the necessary domestic structural reforms would then be easier to realise. However, one tends to overlook the fact that the national authorities would continue to be responsible for implementing reforms and that, moreover, the absorption potential of autonomous monetary and fiscal policies would be forfeited. Even with an independent policy, Switzerland is in a position to outperform if it again focuses on its strengths of flexibility and openness. The independent monetary policy has helped to keep inflation in Switzerland at a low level for decades. This and the diversification properties of the Swiss franc make capital cheaper in Switzerland by approximately 1.5 percentage points (interest premium).
This could affect the real economy via a loss of confidence on the part of households and companies as well as through an additional burden on banks. At the same time, there are upside risks for the global economy. Domestic demand in the emerging economies and the US could, once  BIS Review 85/2010  1  again, prove surprisingly robust. In Europe, export activity could increase more strongly than expected. Swiss economic outlook In Switzerland, the economic recovery has continued. In the first quarter of 2010, real GDP rose by 1.6% on an annualised basis, and was 2.2% above the year-back quarter. Economic activity was mainly driven by household demand and exports of goods and services. The firming of the economic recovery led to a renewed rise in the demand for labour, and short-time work fell significantly. Since the beginning of the year, seasonally adjusted unemployment has also fallen slightly. Leading indicators for labour demand are pointing upwards. The SNB anticipates a gradual improvement in the labour market. Despite the uncertainties in connection with public finances in many countries, global economic activity is still having a supportive effect. Consequently, capacity in the export sector is likely to be increasingly better utilised. Consumption and construction investment will be supported by the improved labour market outlook and the expansionary monetary policy. The SNB expects real GDP to increase by approximately 2% for 2010 as a whole. Monetary and financial conditions The expansionary monetary policy is reflected in monetary conditions.

Philipp Hildebrand: Economic situation and monetary conditions in Switzerland Introductory remarks by Mr Philipp Hildebrand, Chairman of the Governing Board of the Swiss National Bank, at the half-yearly media news conference, Geneva, 17 June 2010. *  *  *  The Swiss National Bank (SNB) is maintaining its expansionary monetary policy. Consequently, it is leaving the target range for the three-month Libor unchanged at 0.00–0.75% and intends to hold the Libor in the lower part of the target range, at around 0.25%. The recovery of the global economy continues and the Swiss economy is benefiting from it. Although the weakening of the euro with respect to the Swiss franc is dampening export activity, this activity is being supported by growth in foreign demand. The domestic sector is still performing favourably. For 2010, the SNB is now expecting real GDP growth of about 2.0%. In view of these pleasing developments, the deflationary risk in Switzerland has largely disappeared. At the same time, uncertainty has increased since the last monetary policy assessment. The latest tensions on the financial markets, particularly with regard to the public finances of some individual countries, have increased the downside risks. Should these downside risks materialise and, via an appreciation of the Swiss franc, lead to a renewed threat of deflation, the SNB would take all the measures necessary to ensure price stability. The SNB’s conditional inflation forecast for 2010 and 2011 has increased slightly since March. It remains unchanged for 2012.