lisa d cook : welcoming remarks - 5th annual conference on " nontraditional data, machine learning, and natural language processing in macroeconomics " welcoming remarks by ms lisa d cook, member of the board of governors of the federal reserve system, at the 5th annual conference on " nontraditional data, machine learning, and natural language processing in macroeconomics ", washington dc, 13 november 2023. * * * good morning, and welcome to the 5th annual conference on " nontraditional data, machine learning, and natural language processing in macroeconomics. " 1 in a world with evolving data sources and significant advances in computing, it is important to constantly improve the conceptual framework that macroeconomic policymakers use to inform their critical decisions. this conference brings academics and practitioners together to think carefully about that framework and to push for advancements that could lead to improved economic outcomes. the federal reserve hosted the inaugural edition of this gathering in 2019. since then, the conference has evolved into an international partnership between academics, central banks, statistical agencies, and international organizations, with the bank of italy, the bank of canada, and the swedish riksbank hosting recent editions. the conference is also now jointly organized with the central bank research association and the economics with nontraditional data and analytical tools program, which will further enhance its international scope. we are grateful for the international and domestic partnerships that have emerged from this event and its predecessors. today, we have about 90 in - person participants in attendance, representing 30 agencies and foreign central banks. as we continue to leverage new data and master emerging techniques, cooperation between those that provide the statistics, those that base policy upon them, and those that leverage the latest methodologies to understand them will be of paramount importance. coordination between statistical agencies and policymaking institutions helps us achieve our shared goal - a better understanding of the economy. from our own institutional perspective, the federal reserve uses a broad array of government and private - sector data to continually assess the state of the economy, inform our outlook for economic activity, and evaluate the risks around that outlook in pursuit of our dual mandate of maximum employment and stable prices. not surprisingly, the emergence of nontraditional, high - frequency data was integral to better understanding the real - time effects of the covid - 19 pandemic and its economic consequences. 2 in the current environment, we employ a wide variety of tools and techniques to best distill useful signals related to inflation and the labor market from the

european central bank : press conference - introductory statement introductory statement by mr willem f duisenberg, president of the european central bank and mr lucas papademos, vice - president of the european central bank, at the press conference held in frankfurt, 8 may 2003. * * * ladies and gentlemen, the vice - president and i will now report on the outcome of today ’ s meeting of the governing council of the ecb. the first news i can report is that today we successfully concluded our discussions of the ecb ’ s monetary policy strategy. however, i would ask you to postpone any questions you may have on this subject to a little later this afternoon. a press release will be issued on this matter and mr. issing will join us for a special press briefing in the form of a seminar on the outcome of our discussions. this seminar will take place in this room immediately after the press conference. you will also note that, as a consequence of the conclusions we reached, i have restructured today ’ s introductory statement somewhat, and i will be following this new structure in the future. the introductory statement will henceforth present first economic analysis, followed by monetary analysis. it concludes by crosschecking the analyses conducted under these two pillars. turning now to our discussion of monetary policy, we have decided to keep our key interest rates unchanged. taking due account of new economic and monetary information as well as the latest geopolitical developments, we concluded that the current monetary policy stance remains consistent with the preservation of price stability over the medium term. at the same time it maintains a monetary environment that is conducive to economic growth. with the end of the military action in iraq, important downside risks to the economic recovery have diminished, and our focus is now again on the other forces that have been shaping the economic outlook. the governing council will carefully monitor future developments and assess whether conditions for price stability continue to develop favourably. let me explain our assessment in detail. in the context of our economic analysis, focusing on the short to medium term, recently published survey data and the latest information from conjunctural indicators suggest that economic activity in the euro area has remained subdued so far this year. looking ahead, we continue to expect a gradual strengthening of real gdp growth to start later in 2003 and to gather more pace in the course of next year. factors supporting this outlook are an expected recovery of global demand, the prospect of falling inflation benefiting real disposable income