Central Banks' Involvement in Encouraging Economic Education and Literacy

Currently, economic education plays a vital role in the future health of world economy and enables citizens to efficiently participate in the society in which they live. The economic literacy of citizens is not only the problem of state authorities, but it is also a common challenge and responsibility for many public institutions and non-profit organizations. Key players among these institutions are central banks that invest significant resources in educating the public to achieve economic efficiency, a good conduct of monetary policy and welfare. The aim of the paper is to emphasize the involvement of more-and-more central banks in fostering economic education and literacy, not before clarifying some key concepts and highlighting the importance of the subject in our society.economic education, economic literacy, educational product, knowledge based society, central banks

Inflation Targeting In Romania in the Perspective of Joining the Exchange Rate Mechanism II

Since the early 1990, when the Reserve Bank of New Zeeland instituted for the first time inflation targeting (IT) as its monetary policy framework, IT gained reputation, becoming the monetary regime of choice of many central banks around the world. Among them, the National Bank or Romania changed in mid-2005 the strategy of the monetary policy with IT. As a member of the European Union, Romania’s ultimately aspiration is the adoption of the euro as a means to achieve its objective of full participation in the European Monetary Union. In order to accomplish that, among other nominal and real convergence criteria, Romania must spend at least two years in the ERM II, keeping its exchange rate towards the euro stable, inside a band of ±15%. The purpose of this paper is to identify the challenges of direct IT implementation in Romania in the current context with the perspective of joining the ERM II. We will find out that IT, as current monetary policy strategy, is to be maintained at least until the ERM II entry. After that the NBR’s focus will shift back from price stability to exchange rate stability, and thus, a strict IT framework will not be appropriate anymore (the co-existence of IT with an explicit exchange rate objective being quite problematic). The paper concludes that a soft version of inflation-targeting is more appropriate under the given circumstances.Monetary policy, inflation targeting, european monetary union, ERM II

THE PARTICULARITIES OF THE MONETARY POLICY TRANSMISSION MECHANISM IN ROMANIA

The process of transmitting monetary policy impulses to the real economy presents o series of particularities from one country to another, mainly because of the diversity of financial systems. Thereby, the functionality of various monetary policy transmission channels is significantly influenced by the specific features of each country's financial system. The objective of this paper is to highlight some of the key features of the monetary policy transmission mechanism in Romania, taking into consideration the dominant role of the banking sector in the national financial system.monetary policy, transmission mechanism, interest rate channel, credit channel

ANALYSIS ON THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE PROFIT TAX AND INVESTMENTS IN THE CONTEXT OF A GLOBALISED WORLD. CASE STUDY – ROMANIA

Although it is a relative old concept, having ruts in the writings of the late „60s, globalization has become in current times a cliché, being used in many parts of the world and in many languages but not having a specific definition. Financial globalization is considered to be the core element of the process of globalization and consists in a complex integration of financial markets through exchange and financial flows. In this context, the economic agents are considered to be important players, given the fact that fortheir investments they appeal to financial recourses wherever they may be. However there investment behavior is greatly influenced by the state, through the fiscal policy, especially through a very important instrument at its disposal, the profit tax rate.The aim of this paper is to emphasize the evolution of the relationship between the profit tax and investments, in the case of Romania from 1990 until 2008, trying to show particular developments of each of this two variables studied and the relations between them, the amplitude of influence exercised by them. The paper also focuses upon a better understanding of how the variables analyzed influence the real economy in this globalized environment.globalization, economic policy, investment, profit tax rate, FDI

The Real Economy after Episodes of Financial Crises in Central and Eastern Europe

The occurrence of the most critical international economical and financial crisis of the 21st century brought into the spotlight the damages that crises can bring to our economy. After its burst in the autumn of 2007, the crisis has spread all over the world through the Contagion Effect, and has led to an accelerated and sharp deterioration of economic activity. The effects of the episodes of financial crises have on the real economy seem to be more important and persistent in some specific countries. For this reason we focused our attention upon eight European transition countries and a sample of thirteen financial crises. The aim of this study is to perform an econometric analysis of the effects of episodes of financial crises on real output (GDP) for eight economies from Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) using an ARDL equation and an impulse response function. The main findings of the paper suggest that, in the case of the CEE economies analyzed, financial crises have an important and long-lasting effect, lowering the real output by about 12-14%

Macro determinants of shadow banking in Central and Eastern European countries

Our study aims to quantitatively assess some of the determinants of shadow banking dynamics in 11 European Union (E.U.) countries from Central and Eastern Europe (C.E.E.) over the period 2004–2017. Using panel data estimation techniques and a quarterly data set compiled from several publicly available data sources, we alternatively evaluate the impact of six macroeconomic and financial variables on two dependent variables corresponding to two different measures of the shadow banking sector, namely the broad one (including all non-monetary financial institutions, except insurance corporations and pension funds) and the narrow one (excluding from the above one the investment funds, other than money market funds [M.M.F.]). Our findings confirm that shadow banking is sensitive to overall macroeconomic conditions and that economic growth positively influences the expansion of this segment of the financial sector. In addition, a higher demand for funds from institutional investors, which also reveals a more developed financial system, supports the expansion of the shadow banking sector. Moreover, in a low interest rate environment, the search for yield makes investors turn to shadow banks, while the development of the shadow banking sector is also found to be complementary to the development of the rest of the financial system, in particular, traditional banks

Sustenabilitatea educației doctorale în economie și afaceri

Volumul ”Sustenabilitatea educației doctorale în economie și afaceri” valorifică ideile și cercetările doctoranzilor de la Universitatea “Alexandru Ioan Cuza” din Iași, școala doctorală de economie și administrarea afacerilor. Lucrările au fost prezentate, prin postere sau în plen, în conferința finală a proiectului SESYR, finanțat prin programul european Jean Monnet. Structurarea volumului în patru subcapitole generice are ca scop valorificarea domeniilor considerate prin filosofia proiectului:managementul proiectelor, antreprenoriat si angajabilitate pentru tinerii cercetători. O colecție de 24 de articole având 35 de autori, oferă un mediu de dezbatere științifică provocatoare pentru publicul cititor din domeniul economic. Focalizarea subiectelor din articolele prezente pe motivațiile de cercetare ale doctoranzilor și postdoctoranzilor face ca acest volum să reprezinte un debut publicistic pentru unii autori iar pentru alții, o consolidare a vocației. Diseminarea pasiunilor în astfel de contexte consolidează colaborarea și deschiderea spre noi subiecte investigative. Volumul este destinat studenților, cercetătorilor și profesorilor și îl propunem ca reper bibliografic pentru dezvoltarea altor idei de cercetare și inovare în arealul nostru tematic

GREEN BANKING: A SHARED RESPONSIBILITY BETWEEN FINANCIAL REGULATORS AND BANKING INSTITUTIONS

As the impact of the global financial economic crisis of 2007/2008 diminished and the world economy began to recover, policymakers started to look towards new ways of attaining prosperity through sustainable, equitable and robust economic growth. To achieve this desiderate, the financial system (as the main provider of financial capital) had to fully embrace sustainability practices and integrate them in all its internal processes. Within the financial system, the banking sector is undoubtedly the main player. As such, banks also had to join the sustainable development wave. Hence, ‘green banking’ is becoming a central focus point for many researchers and practitioners as they provide various interpretations of the concept and highlight the best practices. The aim of this paper is twofold: to identify the role of financial regulation and regulators (mostly, Central Banks) in harnessing Green Banking and to determine the involvement of banking institutions in fostering Green Banking. It begins with unpacking the ‘Green Banking’ concept by revealing the most relevant (from a theoretical standpoint) and practical (considering its applicability in the real economy) approaches to date, in order to better grasp and fine-tune its meaning. After analysing qualitatively and critically the most important research papers and institutional reports to date, the paper provides the reader with the essential toolkit for moving forward with a more in-depth investigation on Green Banking

ANALYSIS OF THE MAIN STRUCTURAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE ROMANIAN FINANCIAL SYSTEM

To know and to understand the factors within a financial system that significantly influences the institutions behaviour and the market responses to the central bank actions is of great importance for the monetary authorities and for the achievement of their monetary policy objectives. In Romania, the National Bank must pay special attention to financial institutions given their significant role in the process of financial intermediation (bank-based system). This study aims to conduct an investigation of the main coordinates of the Romanian financial system that are relevant for the study of the monetary policy transmission mechanism. The study focuses on the following features of the Romanian financial system: financial deepening, the existence of a bank-based system, the concentration degree of the Romanian banking sector, the balance sheet structure of monetary financial institutions and the soundness of the banking system. The study also considers the effects of the recent financial market turmoil on the financial system. The span of the empirical study covers the period after 2000 but brings to the forefront the period before and after October 2008. We believe that this research provides useful information for a future analysis of the Romanian monetary policy transmission mechanism

Consideration on the price stability – financial stability relationship in the context of financial globalization

This study is focused upon the involvement of the central banks regarding the fulfillment of the two main objectives: price stability and financial stability. These two key concepts are part of an old and ongoing debate that the current turmoil has revived, and that is whether monetary policy should aim, or not, at ensuring financial stability in parallel to its main objective of price stability. On both sides there are solid and well known arguments. In the beginning of the study I have considered a literature review with regard to price and financial stability issues. After that I have tried to shed some light (from a theoretical point of view) on the nature and dynamics of the fundamental interlinkages between the two aspects and there implications on the central banks and the economy. Finally I outline some general conclusions that have emerged in the present study.Price stability, financial stability, central banks, monetary policy, primary objective, financial turmoil, financial system, financial globalisation