samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
As the study team has found out, emigrants in Italy have a high banking utilization rate – more than 50 percent have bank accounts. On the Albanian side, this figure drops to less than 20 percent. Emigrant families’ access to banks is suboptimal despite the considerable geographical expansion of commercial banks in recent years. In contrast with other remittance-receiving countries, banks in Albania still have only a small market share in remittance services. However, there are encouraging signs of demand for new technologies, innovative partnerships and entry points to reach disadvantaged groups. The high fees of the money transfer applied by the banks are often brought up as a motive why individuals do not prefer this service. Nevertheless, there is already an Albanian commercial bank, which offers transfers from Italy to Albania without charging any fee for amounts up to 250 euros a day, when the average monthly delivery of emigrants usually ranges from 100 to 150 euros. In the meantime, there are several other banks that provide the same service for transfers from Greece. Actually, we are examining the possibilities to lower the transfer costs through broader bilateral agreements between the two countries. Even though, money transfer companies provide transfer services at reasonable rates with a good geographical coverage, we still observe a lot of cash entering the country in bags. I retain, this is more a regulatory problem rather than the preference of emigrants to go informal.

Jean-Pierre Danthine: The strong franc and the future of Switzerland’s financial market infrastructure – two current challenges for the Swiss National Bank Speech by Mr Jean-Pierre Danthine, Member of the Governing Board of the Swiss National Bank, at a Money Market Event, Geneva, 3 November 2011. *  *  *  The speaker would like to thank Marlene Amstad, Anna Faber, Peter Kuster, Angelo Ranaldo, Andy Sturm, Dominik Salierno and Andreas Wehrli for their valuable support in drafting this speech and preparing this presentation. Introduction In today’s global economy, central banks face no shortage of challenges. Of the many issues we confront, I will discuss two that are currently of particular relevance to the Swiss National Bank (SNB). The strength of the Swiss franc is on everyone’s mind. This summer it became a predicament of unprecedented dimensions and it continues to put tremendous pressure on the Swiss economy. I will address this topic in the second part of my speech. By contrast, the challenge I will discuss first – the future of Switzerland’s financial market infrastructure (FMI) – is not making headlines at present. Essentially, the term FMI encompasses the exchanges, central counterparties, settlement systems, central securities depositories and other service providers which support the financial system. This infrastructure is central to the functioning of financial markets. It is crucial for the implementation of monetary policy and participants’ access to central bank liquidity. As long as the FMI functions smoothly, it rarely attracts public attention.
Management will now enjoy greatly enhanced freedom and flexibility in determining how to best deliver products and services to the marketplace, and the market will judge the correctness of those choices. Some have perceived the newly authorized powers to benefit only large bank holding companies. This is not correct. The strategic freedom the Act provides is available to all banking organizations, regardless of size. Indeed, more than two-thirds of initial institutions seeking to become financial holding companies have assets of less than $ billion. Institutions will have to decide for themselves how, or even whether, they should take advantage of the newly authorized activities to build value for their customers and shareholders. Many franchises will succeed by focusing on traditional, face-to-face banking, which continues to have real economic value. Newer technological capacities and techniques are awe-inspiring, to be sure, but effective and profitable banking is ultimately about trust, and human nature hasn’t changed we still appreciate a face across the desk. In addition, as some large organizations have become even larger through mergers, many community banks have been able to attract customers whose needs have not been met by larger institutions. How institutions pursue new opportunities will be just as important as their decision whether to pursue. It is one thing to gain FHC status and begin to prudently experiment with new powers, and quite another to dive head-long into the deep end of the pool with full-scale acquisitions or rapid expansion into new businesses.

Unprecedented economic prosperity At the dawn of the twenty-first century, we find ourselves at an unprecedented moment in the nation’s economic history. The US economy has just completed its 37th consecutive quarter of expansion, the unemployment rate is at its lowest level in three decades and labor force participation by our adult population is at its highest rate since the Second World War, when these statistics included the millions of Americans in uniform. Meanwhile, inflation has remained all but dormant, something thought not to be possible when the economy is growing so rapidly and unemployment is so low. Our prosperity is the envy of the world, and our economic model is acknowledged everywhere to be one that works. It’s not perfect, nor is it applicable in every detail to countries with different histories, cultures and values. Still, it is clear that in the longer run the market is better at allocating scarce resources than any version of a command economy. Importance of maintaining sound credit standards The remarkable duration of the current economic expansion and the strength of the banking system are not coincidental events. Without an effectively functioning banking system for encouraging, collecting and deploying society’s savings in a fair and impartial way into productive investments, there would be little hope for our economy, or any other, to mobilize the real resources necessary for economic growth and stability. With this in mind, one of my major concerns going forward is the quality of bank lending.
11  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/speeches and @BoE_PressOffice  11  Figure 3: Illustrative example of graduated liquidity requirements  12  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/speeches and @BoE_PressOffice  12

The broader point is that everyone needs to have confidence that the Fund is fair and impartial in the way it goes about its work. Surveillance needs to be free from any perception of bias if it is to be credible. This is sensitive territory. Members are prohibited from attempting to influence staff as they discharge their functions. But present arrangements offer plenty of scope for misperceptions. There is a fuzzy boundary between legitimate concern for the quality and relevance of surveillance and improper pressure on staff to fudge difficult issues or water down unpalatable conclusions. A surveillance remit would clarify the boundaries between staff and members without sacrificing accountability. The role and performance of the Executive Board is clearly a critical issue. Putting to one side the long-running debate about the case for shifting to a non-resident Board, there is ample room for modernisation and improvement. Could the conflicts inherent in the MD’s dual role be more transparently managed? And could the Board refocus it own efforts to better support the wider surveillance agenda? Last year, for example, it spent just 5% of its time mulling over multilateral surveillance issues – at a time when global imbalances and energy prices were headline news. Finally, reform is a process not an event. The structure, processes, incentives and culture of an organisation whose core activity is surveillance are likely to be significantly different from one whose primary focus is on lending to countries confronting financial crises.
In addition, Banque de France has launched in June 2017 “Le Lab”. Le Lab is a genuine Open Innovation laboratory: its goal is to bring new practices and technologies into our activities, and to that end experiment where necessary within short and flexible cycles. To do so, it works in close collaboration with innovative firms. And, we launched this year our first “suptech” program to promote the use of artificial intelligence in the performance of supervisory tasks. To illustrate how we can leverage on the daily contact with innovators, to help changing regulation or defining supervisory expectations, I will take the example of the on-going work on artificial intelligence by the ACPR Fintech team. When the ACPR published their report on AI in 2018, we made it clear that the purpose was not to regulate ex ante, with a risk of hindering a promising technology. However, it seemed to us important to raise at an early stage the key  issues of governance, ethics, auditability and explainability, in order to promote a sound development of AI in the financial sector. And the Fintech team did not stop there. They have been conducting experimentations with voluntary financial institutions or providers to explore these issues further, on a few significant AI use cases (AML-CT, internal models and consumer protection). Bilateral meetings were complemented by tests in real conditions, where ACPR experts and data scientists from the Banque de France were able to run algorithms, modulate parameters, test new population samples or compare different models.

The euro/dollar exchange rate is conventionally quoted to four decimal places, so a pip is 0.0001. At the current exchange rate that is approximately equal to one basis point, allowing comparison to spreads in other markets. 11 http://www.haraldhau.com/wp-content/uploads/FX_PriceDiscrimination_in_FX_OTC_markets.pdf. The chart is based on 548, 298 trades in vanilla forward in EUR/USD involving 10,087 clients and 204 dealers between April 1, 2016 and March 31, 2017, as reported on the DTCC, REGIS and UnaVista trade repositories. 10  9  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/speeches  9  can also be too low as well as too high. Business won at zero or negative spreads – eg to build market share – cannot be sustained in the long run, unless compensated by more remunerative returns elsewhere. Persistently compressed earnings have in the past been one factor cited as a trigger for misconduct. But these results do give some sense of the potential gains that might be available from improved understanding of FX markets, and effective use of execution technologies. How to navigate a fragmented market: disclosures, TCA and the Global Code  How can the buyside make practical progress in this area? I want to highlight three main areas for action: demanding better disclosures; seeking more effective technology; and adopting the Global Code. Effective disclosures are a necessary precondition for ensuring good service.
21 Second, MAS is studying whether existing incentives for funds and fund managers, which have been successful in attracting traditional asset managers to set up in Singapore and to grow over time, are suitable to anchor VC funds and VC fund managers here too. We recognise that VC funds and fund managers are typically smaller in size and headcount than traditional asset managers. But they contribute in a different way, by supporting entrepreneurship and innovation in Singapore and the region. We will take this into account in assessing the requirements for VC funds and fund managers to qualify for our incentives. Conclusion 22 Innovation will drive Singapore’s economic future. It will disrupt existing business models, but it is how consumers get better value, how new firms can scale up and grow internationally, and how we create quality jobs for our people. 23 This innovation village is part of this ongoing journey. It will, I am sure, nurture a new generation of technology entrepreneurs in the FinTech space. I congratulate Marvelstone once again for the successful launch of LATTICE80. 3/3  BIS central bankers' speeches

In 1973, western economies experienced a recession which would prove to be the start of a long period of sluggish growth. Annual GDP growth in Western Europe was nearly halved compared with the previous ten-year period. This was largely due to a negative shift in productivity growth. In addition, we experienced a cost shock as a result of the oil crisis in 1973. In Norway, the recession in the 1970s was dealt with by means of a strong counter-cyclical policy. Despite price regulation and rising unemployment, inflation rose sharply. This was an indication that structural shifts had taken place in the economy in the 1970s, shifts that were not apparent to politicians and economists at the time. The objective of full employment was given priority at the expense of price stability.3 But we did not achieve higher growth in exchange for higher inflation. An economic policy that fuels inflation does not generate higher economic growth. On the contrary, it paves the way for subsequent recession and unemployment. It would take time, however, before this view took hold in Norway. One of the first to express this idea clearly during the debate in Norway was Per Schreiner, Director General in the Ministry of Finance at the time. He wrote the following in 1982:4 “It has been a common belief in the Nordic countries for a long time that it was possible to make a political choice between price stability and full employment.
2  BIS central bankers’ speeches  Banks with wide regional networks would possess the intimate knowledge of each economy and understands the unique requirements of SMEs. Such banks are well placed to serve and harness SMEs’ capability to participate more meaningfully in the region’s production networks. For ASEAN financial institutions, the prospect of regional financial integration will also serve to raise industry standards across the region. This includes enhancing the breadth and quality of financial products and services as a result of more efficient markets and the transfer of knowledge and technology. Financial institutions will also need to meet higher standards in how they manage risk and govern their operations. To some extent, this will be driven by regulatory efforts to elevate prudential and business conduct standards – a point which I will return to in a few moments. But aside from regulation, greater economies of scale and scope will also make it more feasible for financial institutions to invest in talent and more advanced technology and systems, to support business development and risk management. These benefits accrue not only to those individual financial institutions which are regionally oriented, but also more broadly to national financial systems. Greater market integration can contribute to the deepening of domestic financial markets which is important to encourage the more efficient allocation of capital and dispersion of risk more broadly, thereby strengthening the economy and financial system against external shocks.

Mugur Isărescu: The Transatlantic renaissance – Romania as a faithful partner and ambitious player Opening speech by Mr Mugur Isărescu, Governor of the National Bank of Romania, at the Conference “The Transatlantic Renaissance: Romania as a Faithful Partner and Ambitious Player”, Bucharest, 9 December 2013. *  *  *  Prime Minister Ponta, Mr. Kennedy, Your Excellences, Ladies and gentlemen, It is a great pleasure for the National Bank of Romania, and an honor for me and the board members, to welcome such a distinguished audience. I salute the presence of Victor Ponta, Prime Minister of Romania, who will be the keynote speaker today and that of Craig Kennedy, the President of German Marshall Fund of the United States. Allow me to greet their Excellences, members of the diplomatic corps, as well as the other notable guests who represent an important array of successful domains of activity. A special welcome to Mircea Geoană, President of Aspen Institute Romania and his team of young, talented and hardworking professionals. Today’s gathering has a challenging topic: “The Transatlantic Renaissance: Romania as a Faithful Partner and Ambitious Player”. Here, at the National Bank of Romania, we take pride in having always been a forum for debating, in an open and profound manner, the themes and trends defining our age. Thus, it is the perfect venue to host such a conference as this one, which encourages individuals to reflect on ideals and ideas that define good society through leadership, dialogue, entrepreneurship and regional stability.
We discuss in turn how each might potentially be affected by the degree of market power in product markets and higher mark-ups. (i)  Phillips curve  In the New Keynesian model, firms operate in imperfectly competitive product markets defined by monopolistic competition (Blanchard and Kiyotaki (1987)), with nominal rigidities (Calvo (1983)). As first described by Chamberlin (1933), and formalised by Dixit and Stiglitz (1977), monopolistic competition is an environment in which a large number of firms each face a downward-sloping demand curve for their respective differentiated product. This typically takes the functional form:  11  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches  11  𝑌 𝑑 (𝑖) = (  𝑃𝑡 (𝑖) ) 𝑃𝑡  −𝜖  𝑌𝑡  (3)  𝑌 𝑑 (𝑖) is the demand for good 𝑖, whose price is 𝑃𝑡 (𝑖). 𝑃𝑡 and 𝑌𝑡 are the overall price level and aggregate demand at time 𝑡, respectively, while 𝜖 is the elasticity of substitution between the monopolistically competitive products. Individual firms are assumed to be small enough that a price change by one firm has a negligible effect on the demand faced by other firms. By implication, there is no strategic interaction between firms. Firms can set prices above marginal costs because of a finite elasticity of substitution between individual goods in consumer preferences, regardless of the fact that their share of the total market is small. There are clear limitations of this product market formulation when addressing issues of market power.

Relaxing monetary policy too little might not be enough to break the upward pressure on the franc; relaxing monetary policy too much might lead to inflationary tendencies later on. The dilemma faced by the SNB would become even greater should the pressure on the Swiss franc to appreciate become more pronounced. In such a situation, we could react by pegging the exchange rate of the franc to the Euro. A peg could either be temporary or the Swiss authorities could decide to link the Swiss franc permanently to the new single currency through a fixed exchange rate. BIS Review 102/1997  -5-  A permanent peg could do away with the problem of an appreciating currency. It would, however, have major drawbacks: First, we would give up our relative autonomy in setting the course of monetary policy in Switzerland. Monetary conditions in our country would be determined entirely by the ECB. As a consequence, interest rates would rise close to the level prevailing in the EMU. Adapting to this new level of interest rates would pose major problems, especially for the real estate sector and for those sectors of the economy which rely on low interest rates to finance their capital-intensive production. Second, choosing the right parity in a system with fixed exchange rates is a very difficult task. A peg that would leave the Swiss franc overvalued would force the SNB to follow a monetary policy that is too restrictive.
•  Payments – Apple, Google, Paypal, Amazon, and Alibaba have payment solutions that replace physical wallets and credit cards. •  Lending - Zopa, Lending Club, and Funding Circle offer peer-to-peer lending solutions that match lenders and borrowers on their online platforms. •  Investment – “robo-advisers” like WealthFront use data analytics to dispense online personal financial advice and investment management services. Indeed, these non-financial firms look set to disrupt the financial industry. •  As a senior banker in the US puts it: “People need banking, not banks”. The second thing that is happening is that FIs are fighting back. •  As disintermediation threatens FIs, they are being pushed into a rethink of their business models. •  Rising costs, shrinking margins, and the weight of new regulatory requirements are pressing FIs to look into more cost-efficient ways of running their businesses. •  They are increasingly turning towards innovation and technology for solutions. BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  •  In an ironic way, the FinTech insurgency is forcing change among the incumbent FIs. Leveraging on their size and networks, FIs are using technology much more intensely to enhance their product offerings and service delivery. •  Example: US insurance companies, Progressive and Allstate, are using telematics to develop usage-based motor insurance, also known as Pay-As-You-Drive (or PayHow-You-Drive). •  Instead of rewarding past good driving behaviour, these insurers are able to price premiums contemporaneously with current driving habits. What does all this mean?

As we work to help restore balance to the economy and bring down inflation, our actions will always be driven by the data, and we will remain focused on achieving maximum employment and price stability. 1 Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, Statement on Longer-Run Goals and Monetary Policy  Strategy, as adopted effective January 24, 2012. 2 See Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, Federal Reserve Issues FOMC Statement, November  3, 2021; Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, Federal Reserve Issues FOMC Statement, December 15, 2021; and Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, Federal Reserve Issues FOMC Statement, January 26, 2022. 3 Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, Principles for Reducing the Size of the Federal Reserve's  Balance Sheet, January 26, 2022. 4/4  BIS central bankers' speeches