samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
Nonetheless, I wish to state that efforts are underway to make IFRS a mandatory requirement for financial institutions. It is important for this provision to become a legal requirement in order to enhance the credibility of financial statements that are being produced by institutions governed by the various laws. I wish to state here that as much as it is important to follow international standards, these need to be reviewed for their relevance and practical application locally. It is also important to look at their relevance to small and medium enterprises where compliance may place additional burdens on operations. Ladies and Gentlemen, as we discuss the harmonization of various laws, I would like to bring up the issue of money laundering. The Prohibition and Prevention of the Money Laundering Act (PPMLA), enacted in 2001 requires all persons, whether corporate or unincorporated, to comply with its provisions. Although the Act does not impose specific obligations on accountants, they are expected to comply with its provisions. It has been noted from the recent court cases on abuse of office and corruption that professional entities such as law and accounting firms have been used as a channel to launder some of the proceeds of crime. As we are all aware, one of the duties of accountants is to know the sources and application of the resources in their organization. Therefore I don’t think it is unfair to say that in most organisations, where money is being laundered, an accountant is involved.

I urge ZICA to ensure this program is relevant not only to Zambia but to our neighbouring countries in order to provide an alternative to the costlier international professional training courses. This is a potential area of foreign exchange earnings for this country. The competitive strength of our country can only be proven by our ability to sell in the most demanding of international markets. As I conclude, let me challenge ZICA and all its members to assist in promoting efforts to improve the financial capability and financial education in Zambia. I particularly would like to urge ZICA to partner with Non-Governmental Organisations as well as the Ministry of  BIS Review 57/2010  3  Education in promoting financial education in schools and other institutions of learning in rural areas. This sort of collaborative approach provides an excellent model for how professionals should put their expertise to good use in local communities across the country. At this time when the world economy is at crossroad, I am sure the accountancy profession is positioned to take a leadership role in helping to steer our way out of the financial crisis, through high-quality accounting and auditing standards; through high-quality ethical standards and through an understanding and support of the growth of Small and Medium Enterprises. Ladies and Gentlemen, I thank you for your attention. 4  BIS Review 57/2010
As a result, the Norwegian financial system only had limited exposure to the subprime mortgage market – notwithstanding some municipalities in the northern part of Norway that got involved, with a less than full understanding of inherent risks. Our banks were therefore relatively unaffected by the recent crisis when it comes to credit risk. The downturn that our economy experienced in 2009 was modest in relation to other countries – but this is of course also due to the composition of our production and exports, with oil accounting for a large share. More than two decades ago, in the early stages of the Norwegian banking crisis, Norges Bank provided a large liquidity loan to a savings bank. The bank, however, soon became insolvent. We learnt how fast illiquidity can turn into insolvency. At the time, the bank was rescued partly by Norges Bank writing off its loan. This incident showed that it was important to clarify the division of responsibilities between the central bank and the fiscal authorities. The Government Bank Insurance Fund was established, which would be able to extend loans and inject capital into distressed banks in the future. The aim was to make sure Norges Bank avoided intruding into the arena of the fiscal authorities. It is not up to an independent central bank to spend taxpayers’ money. When Norwegian banks’ funding dried up in the aftermath of the Lehman Brothers collapse, government bonds were swapped for covered bonds issued by banks.

Øystein Olsen: Does Norway save too much? Speech by Mr Øystein Olsen, Governor of Norges Bank (Central Bank of Norway), at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, Washington DC, 22 March 2018. * * * Accompanying slides of the speech. INTRODUCTION First, let me thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today. I am very happy to visit the Peterson Institute. Norway is a small, open economy which was transformed by the discovery of oil on our continental shelf almost 50 years ago. Back in 1970, the year after the first discovery, income levels were relatively low compared with other western countries. That picture has changed completely. Lower oil prices in recent years have reduced the relative income level somewhat, but measured by GDP per capita, Norway still ranks among the richest countries in the world. Graph: GDP per capita Natural resource discoveries have been identified as a curse for some countries. For Norway, it has been a blessing. We have managed to transform oil and gas resources into real and financial assets. Luck has been supplemented with what I dare claim is a sensible handling of the resources. At an early stage, it was concluded that the resources belong to the Norwegian people. Large savings in recent years means that also future generations will benefit from the revenues. Graph: The petroleum fund mechanism Direct government participation in the industry and an extraordinary tax rate for oil companies, currently at 78 percent, ensure that most of the resource rents flow into government coffers.
On a quarterly basis, euro area real GDP growth was flat in the first quarter of 2012, following a decline of 0.3% in the previous quarter. Economic indicators point to weak economic activity in the second quarter of 2012 and at the beginning of the third quarter, in an environment of heightened uncertainty. Looking beyond the short term, we expect the euro area economy to recover only very gradually, with growth momentum being further dampened by a number of factors. In particular, tensions in some euro area sovereign debt markets and their impact on financing conditions, the process of balance sheet adjustment in  BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  the financial and non-financial sectors and high unemployment are expected to weigh on the underlying growth momentum, which is also affected by the ongoing global slowdown. The risks surrounding the economic outlook for the euro area continue to be on the downside. They relate, in particular, to the tensions in several euro area financial markets and their potential spillover to the euro area real economy. Downside risks also relate to possible renewed increases in energy prices over the medium term. Euro area annual HICP inflation was 2.4% in July 2012, according to Eurostat’s flash estimate, unchanged from the previous month. On the basis of current futures prices for oil, inflation rates should decline further in the course of 2012 and be below 2% again in 2013.

Companies with revenues linked to inflation may use this market to hedge against the perspective of low inflation while companies with liabilities linked to inflation may use it to hedge against the risks of high inflation. Compared to inflation-indexed bonds, they provide a wider maturity spectrum for short and medium horizons. However, they are affected by the same biases, in particular the inflation risk and liquidity premia. This tool, however, usefully complements inflation-indexed bonds in the Eurosystem’s information set7 and, so far, the information provided by this new financial instrument has been broadly  6  See F. Alonso, R. Blanco and A. del Rio: “Estimating Inflation Expectations Using French Government inflation-indexed bonds”, Banco de Espana, Documento de Trabajo, n° 0111, 2001. 7  See for instance the box entitled “Deriving euro area inflation expectations from inflation-linked swaps”, ECB monthly Bulletin, September 2003. 4  BIS Review 37/2004  in line with the information derived from indexed bonds, suggesting an average ten-year expected inflation rate of around 2%. In addition to financial indicators, central banks, and the ECB in particular, also rely heavily on surveys to extract relevant information as regards long-term inflation expectations. I will limit myself to two examples: The first is the quarterly survey that has been carried out by the ECB since 1999, in which information is gathered from professional forecasters.
In Sweden, the latter idea could be realised by allowing a risk-differentiated stability charge to reflect the higher systemic risk that a systemically-important bank entails. Another possibility that is being discussed is to ensure that systemically-important banks have sufficient capital by creating a debt instrument that is automatically converted into capital when capital adequacy falls below a certain level. During the bank crisis of the 1990s, I was in fact involved in designing such an instrument. 1 In this context, the form of the regulations that govern the handling of distressed banks is in fact quite important. If the regulations are ineffective the systemic risk, all else being equal, will be higher. The cost that should be internalised in the banks operations will then be unnecessarily high, which in turn will make financial services unnecessarily expensive. It is, in other words, very important to create an effective regulatory framework that makes it possible to take decisive action to handle distressed banks at an early stage in both Sweden and abroad. 1  The Swedish Bank Support Authority promised Föreningsbanken that the State would acquire preference shares if capital adequacy fell below 9 per cent. At the same time, the State was given the right to acquire shares if the capital fell below 8.5 per cent.

When we now look back we must be self-critical and admit that we did not see the liquidity crisis that developed in the financial system in time. We did, however, issue repeated warnings about the development of risks in the Baltic countries and the fact that risk in general was priced too low on the financial markets. Unfortunately, our warnings in these cases were not sufficiently acted upon. Another lesson to be learned from the crisis is therefore that we – the authorities and perhaps also the financial participants – must be better at seeing the whole picture and understanding the systemic consequences of individual decisions and actions. The authorities must also be given the opportunity to act when an untenable build-up of systemic risk is observed. This may require new tools. This does not necessarily mean that the Riksbank should be in charge of these new tools. Instead, the close cooperation between various authorities needs to be constantly developed. In practice, “new” tools may mean applying “old” individually-oriented regulations more bluntly than previously. If, for example, the aim is to dampen mortgage lending, a blunter application of the regulations may mean that even banks that have been restrictive in their lending are affected by higher costs or stricter regulations, for instance because the authorities introduce higher capital requirements, amortisation requirements or regulations on loan-to-value. These new costs and restrictions will be motivated by systemic concerns rather than the need to safeguard the stability of an individual bank.
It does not take into account that the evolution of relative exchange rates stems, to a great extent, from a natural compensation for inflation rate differentials. This is particularly relevant to Switzerland, where we have experienced far less inflation than our commercial partners over the last thirty years. If this issue is accounted for, that is, in real terms, the Swiss franc can then be said to have appreciated by around 100% against the US dollar and 70% against the British pound since 1973 and by 14% against the Euro between 1999 and today. We learn more if we take a multilateral viewpoint, based on the real effective exchange rate13. On a statistical basis, it can be argued that the Swiss franc’s effective exchange rate has remained more or less stable, at least from 1990 until recently. This does not mean, however, that it has been constant. On the contrary, it fluctuates constantly around its  12  The Bank of England has reached the same decision regarding the British pound. 13  This rationale and the figures that follow refer to the export-weighted real exchange rate (nominal rates which correct the gaps between price indexes and consumption), as published by the BIS. BIS central bankers’ speeches  5  average.14 You may recall, in particular, that for approximately three years in the mid-1990’s it remained well above its long-term average, then peaking at 12% in 1995. Until now, this was the Swiss franc’s most significant deviation from the long term average observed.

Impact of the global economic crisis on Zambia  The Zambian financial sector did not immediately or directly become adversely affected by the credit crunch as was reflected in the continued stability of the banking sector, with most banks being adequately capitalised and the inter-bank market operating normally. This was mainly due to the sector’s limited integration into the international financial markets. Further, our financial sector had no exposure to toxic assets, which led to the credit crunch in most developed markets. However, the ensuing global financial crisis, with the global economic  BIS Review 161/2009  1  recession that followed, adversely affected Zambia, like most global economies, mainly through: reduced revenue earnings from mineral resources; job losses, particularly in the extractive industry; lower foreign capital inflow (both foreign portfolio investment (FPI) and foreign direct investment (FDI)); loss of foreign exchange reserves; rising domestic inflation driven by pass-through effects of the depreciation in the exchange rate of the Kwacha against major currencies; and declining number of foreign tourists. Reduced revenue earnings from mineral resources As you may already know, Zambia, like many African countries, relies heavily on commodity exports. This made the country more vulnerable to the global downturn. The global financial crisis and the plummeting commodity prices on the international market negatively affected Government revenue. The global economic recession resulted in a reduction in world demand for copper, which in turn, led to the precipitous fall in copper prices.
Not one of these countries has a target lower than 2 per cent, but Israel has a target range which goes as low as 1 per cent. If we also include the euro area, Japan, Switzerland and the US among the inflation targeters, we can add that the ECB's target is for inflation to be close to but lower than 2 per cent, and that the target in Switzerland is for inflation to be between 0 and 2 per cent. BIS central bankers’ speeches  3  Figure 1 Inflation has been higher in the UK and the USA, and the fall is expected to be temporary Annual percentage change  Note: HICP is an EU-harmonised index for consumer prices. Quarterly data for Sweden and the UK, annual data for the US. Sources: Bank of England, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Eurostat, IMF, SCB and the Riksbank. Risky to have a target that is too low Another objection to lowering the target is that it would risk reducing confidence in the inflation targeting regime. As I have noted, it is important for monetary policy to stand by a target once it has been formulated. If a target is changed because it seems too difficult to achieve, then there is always a risk that economic agents will expect the same thing to happen in similar situations in the future – both when inflation is higher and when it is lower than the target in place.

The period where inflation has been below the target has gradually become longer and longer. Even the more stable underlying inflation measure, where both interest-rate effects and volatile energy prices are excluded, has been below 2 per cent since January 2010 (see Figure 2). According to the Riksbank’s forecast, it is expected to reach this level again in autumn 2016, provided that monetary policy is very expansionary. This means nearly seven years below the target, at least five of which have been clearly below it. 9  Se for example Williams (2009), Blanchard et al. (2010), Calmfors (2013), Ball (2014), Krugman (2014), and Rosengren (2015). 10  See Côté (2014) and Kryvtsov and Mendes (2015). BIS central bankers’ speeches  5  Figure 2 Inflation has been low for a long time Annual percentage change  Note: CPIF is CPI with fixed mortgage rate. Sources: SCB and the Riksbank. Once inflation had undershot the target for a while, inflation expectations began to fall. Economic agents did not expect inflation to meet the target even five years ahead. In other words, a risk began to build up that the role of the inflation target as a benchmark for pricesetting and wage formation would begin to weaken – that the nominal anchor that has been an important part of the favourable developments in Sweden since the 1990s crisis would no longer hold.
And we have seen how volatile their values can be and how badly hurt retail investors who buy them can be. Asset tokenisation has transformative potential, not unlike securitisation 50 years ago. One, it allows high value financial and real economy assets to be fractionalised and exchanged over the internet on a peer-to-peer basis Two, it allows the assets to be traded securely and seamlessly without the need for intermediaries Three, it can enable Decentralised Finance, or DeFi, where borrowing, lending and trading activities can be performed autonomously through smart contracts, potentially enhancing the efficiency and accessibility of financial services. But DeFi is still in its infancy and is not without significant risks. The dispersed governance processes, coupled with a lack of transparency, renders DeFi difficult to regulate. In traditional finance, if something goes wrong, supervisors can go after the entity, its board and management, and the errant employees. In a DeFi world, there is no responsible entity or individual. How does one take enforcement action against an algorithm? Just as Wood has the capacity to grow from tiny saplings to gigantic trees, we want to nurture the tokenised assets ecosystem. Through Project Guardian, MAS and the financial industry are laying the structures and protocols that will help harness the benefits of tokenised assets and DeFi while managing their risks.

Programmable money means embedding rules within the medium of exchange itself that defines its usage. These rules are retained even when the money is transferred. Why is this useful? Take for example, donations to charity. With programmable money, we can have better assurance that donations reach their intended beneficiaries and the funds are used for their intended purposes. We can programme the beneficiaries and purposes into the money itself. The programmability comes from tokenising the money and placing it on a distributed ledger. There are four options for programmable money: cryptocurrencies, stablecoins, tokenised bank deposits, and central bank digital currencies or CBDCs. Cryptocurrencies are a non-starter. They have performed poorly as a medium of exchange as well as a store of value. Given its volatility and speculative nature, cryptocurrencies do not hold promise to serve as money in the first place. Stablecoins are more promising. If well-regulated and securely backed by reserves – as per MAS' latest proposed regulations – they combine the benefits of stability and programmability. But their pervasive take-up remains to be seen. Tokenised bank deposits are digital representation of commercial banks' deposits that can be used as digital cash to make payments or buy and sell digital assets without going through the banking system. CBDCs, as direct liabilities of the central bank, marry the advantages of central bank issued cash with the advantages of the blockchain. They are essentially digital, programmable versions of cash. Where does MAS stand with respect to these four forms of programmable money?
The progress brought about by this series of reforms approved with broad Parliamentary consensus does not mean that our financial sector does not face significant challenges ahead. During the last upturn households and firms rapidly incurred debt, a process matched by exceptionally high credit growth rates. This setting was conducive to an increase in the size of the banking sector, to the point of reaching a dimension which now, with a much less favourable outlook, will hardly be sustainable. The lower growth in demand compared with the previous stage, combined with the process of corporate and household deleveraging, will entail a fall in the volume of activity. To this can be added various factors which in the near future will act to squeeze unit margins, such as low interest rates, increased bad debts, higher capital requirements for both regulatory and market-related reasons, tighter financing conditions (risk premia are higher than before the crisis) and the increased importance of doubtful asset management. The management of doubtful assets in the real estate sector will be particularly important. In this respect, allow me some brief thoughts on the supervisory activity of the Banco de España. In the last few weeks some opinions have been aired on the lack of transparency of the Spanish banking system, as a consequence of a failure to duly record the excessive concentration of risk in the real estate sector, particularly that in property development companies.

Looking ahead, on the basis of current oil futures prices, headline inflation is likely to pick up further in the near term, largely reflecting movements in the annual rate of change of energy prices. However, measures of underlying inflation are expected to rise more gradually over the medium term, supported by our monetary policy measures, the expected economic recovery and the corresponding gradual absorption of slack. Turning to the monetary analysis, broad money (M3) continues to expand at a robust pace, with its annual rate of growth increasing to 4.8% in November 2016, up from 4.4% in October. As in previous months, annual growth in M3 was mainly supported by its most liquid components, with the narrow monetary aggregate M1 expanding at an annual rate of 8.7% in November, up from 8.0% in October. Loan dynamics followed the path of gradual recovery observed since the beginning of 2014. The annual growth rate of loans to non-financial corporations was 2.2% in November 2016, after 2.1% in the previous month. The annual growth rate of loans to households was 1.9% in November, after 1.8% in October. Although developments in bank credit continue to reflect the lagged relationship with the business cycle, credit risk and the ongoing adjustment of financial and nonfinancial sector balance sheets, the monetary policy measures put in place since June 2014 are significantly supporting borrowing conditions for firms and households and thereby credit flows across the euro area.