Annual Research workshop
The Research Department of the Central Bank of Malta organised a half-day Research Workshop on Monday, 19 November and launched its first Research Bulletin.
The Bulletin consists of four articles written by economists from the Research Department and the Economic Analysis Department on various topics, including the housing market, reforms in the energy sector, revisions in GDP statistics and inequality and income mobility in Malta.
A number of presentations were delivered during this workshop by two external speakers and from the bank’s staff on the latest modelling activities in the area of structural econometric modelling.
Dr Margarita Rubio, Assistant Professor in the School of Economics at the University of Nottingham, delivered a presentation on national macro-prudential policies in the euro area. The presentation described the current institutional framework for macro-prudential policy in the euro area, which still generates a number of doubts because of the complex process for coordinating measures across heteroge- neous members.
Professor Andrew Ellul (Indiana University, Centre for Economic and Policy Research, Centre for Studies of Economics and Finance, European Corporate Governance Institute) delivered a presentation in which he presented evidence, using data from US insurance companies, on how financial institutions’ off-balance sheet commitments induce reaching for yield behaviour, asset interconnectedness in the most risky asset classes and ultimately systemic risk.
The workshop featured a panel session on the latest structural modelling activities of the Research Department of the Central Bank of Malta. Noel Rapa, senior research economist in the Research Department, delivered a presentation on the fiscal extension of Medsea, the structural model developed in recent years following a technical cooperation agreement with experts from Banca d’Italia.
Dr Luca Brugnolini, a research economist in the Research Department, delivered another presentation on the progress made in introducing a banking sector in Medsea