Prepared by Pedro Baptista, Colm Bates, Omiros Kouvavas, Pedro Neves and Katia Werkmeister Understanding how consumers perceive drivers of inflation is crucial for interpreting shifts in their inflation expectations, which can significantly influence real economic decisions. The narratives consumers construct to explain inflation play a key role in shaping their expectations, with different drivers – such as wages or profits – implying different degrees of inflation persistence. To explore this further, in June 2023 and March 2024 the ECB’s Consumer Expectations Survey...

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Five international organisations today released a landmark report that outlines pathways for co-ordinated approaches on climate action, carbon pricing, and the cross-border effects of climate change mitigation policies with a view to achieving global climate goals. The report was presented on 23 October by the Joint Task Force on Climate Action, Carbon Pricing, and Policy Spillovers, convened by the World Trade Organization and joined by the International Monetary Fund, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, United Nations Trade and...

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Abstract: Based on granular data at the product level, this paper looks at whether and how the euro area and the United States have modified their import sourcing strategies since 2016, the role played by geopolitical tensions and the potential impact on import prices. It considers two different, but not mutually exclusive, changes to sourcing strategies for a given product: (i) increasing the number of sourcing countries and (ii) reducing the import market share of the main supplier country. Data...

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Participants: Rodrigo Valdes, Director, Western Hemisphere Department (WHD), IMF Ana Corbacho, Deputy Director, WHD, IMF Luis Cubeddu, Deputy Director, WHD, IMF Moderator: Julie Ziegler, Senior Communications Officer, IMF MS. ZIEGLER: Good morning. Welcome everyone. This is the press briefing for the Regional Economic Outlook for the Western Hemisphere. My name is Julie Ziegler, and I am with the Communications Department at the Fund. I'm going to introduce our panel today. To my immediate left is Rodrigo Valdes, who. the Director of the Western Hemisphere Department. And...

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Growth is projected to hold steady, but amid weakening prospects and rising threats, the world needs a shift in policy gears Blog Post by Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas | Let’s start with the good news: it looks like the global battle against inflation has largely been won, even if price pressures persist in some countries. After peaking at 9.4 percent year-on-year in the third quarter of 2022, we now project headline inflation will fall to 3.5 percent by the end of next...

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By Matthias Rumpf | People have tended to be quite hesitant to trust banks abroad. That seems to be changing. In a post featuring interactive charts for you to explore, The ECB Blog shows that cross-border bank deposits of private households have picked up recently. To what extent are euro area households making use of cross-border deposits? Are households in smaller countries more likely to open accounts abroad and, if they do so, which countries do they choose? This ECB...

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Tokenisation has the potential to offer benefits to the financial system, such as increased efficiency and transparency, but it may also have financial stability implications. This report is focused on a subset of tokenisation initiatives – tokenisation based on distributed ledger technology (DLT) as the underlying technology platform – assessed to be the most relevant for financial stability based on recent market developments. In particular, the report focuses on the tokenisation of financial assets, such as tokenised money that may...

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Washington, D.C. – October 21, 2024: The Principality of Liechtenstein became a member of the IMF today when Prime Minister Daniel Risch signed the Fund’s Articles of Agreement during a ceremony in Washington D.C. Liechtenstein applied for IMF membership in May 2023 (See Press Release 23/190). Subsequently, an IMF team visited Vaduz during November 27-December 8, 2023 (See Press Release 23/430). The principality's decision to join the IMF was confirmed by a majority in a national referendum conducted on September...

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Five international organisations today released a landmark report that outlines pathways for co-ordinated approaches on climate action, carbon pricing, and the cross-border effects of climate change mitigation policies with a view to achieving global climate goals. The report was presented on 23 October by the Joint Task Force on Climate Action, Carbon Pricing, and Policy Spillovers, convened by the World Trade Organization and joined by the International Monetary Fund, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, United Nations Trade and...

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Program will drive U.S. leadership in semiconductors as well as provide the critical technology and skilled workforce needed for U.S. semiconductor packaging Today, the Biden-Harris Administration issued a Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) funded by the CHIPS and Science Act to enable the United States semiconductor industry to adopt innovative new advanced packaging flows for semiconductor technologies. This investment comes as part of the President’s overarching Investing in America agenda, which is increasing American competitiveness and boosting manufacturing in industries of...

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