Earlier than Financial institution Underground goes off on its Christmas holidays, it’s time for the Annual Financial institution Underground Christmas Quiz! We hope you take pleasure in testing your information on our festive themed questions on economics, finance and all issues central banking…
1) (Literature) During which of Jane Austen’s novels had been the Miss Steeles ‘prevailed on to remain practically two months on the park, and to help within the due celebration of that competition which requires a greater than strange share of personal balls and enormous dinner events to proclaim its significance’?
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Right. This festive reference happens in Chapter XXIV of Jane Austen’s novel, highlighting social customs of the time.
Supply: ‘Sense and Sensibility’, Chapter XXIV (Mission Gutenberg).
2) (Financial Historical past) St Nicholas’s Day is well known on 6 December. His behavior of secret gift-giving impressed Santa Claus. What was he stated to have dropped into the home of a poor household beneath the duvet of night time?
Incorrect
Supply: ‘Who is St. Nicholas?: St. Nicholas Center‘.
3) (Commodities) A gold medal on the 1908 London Olympics contained 100% gold. What quantity of gold is present in medals awarded on the 2024 Paris Olympics?
Right. Fashionable gold medals are made primarily of silver with a skinny layer of gold plating (round 6 grams). Against this, medals at earlier Olympics, like these in 1908, had been predominantly gold.
Supply: Worldwide Olympic Committee info on medal compositions.
4) (Central Banking) Throughout 2024, Governor Andrew Bailey had an uncommon encounter with which animal?
Incorrect
Supply: ‘Yorkshire Wildlife Park Ltd‘.
Incorrect
5) (Macroeconomics) What, by legislation, should be offered to HM Treasury by Christmas Day 2024?
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Right. This report should be submitted yearly to HM Treasury beneath the Monetary Companies and Markets Act 2023.
Supply: UK laws on monetary oversight necessities.
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6) (Financial Historical past) Christmas Day appears at all times to have been a vacation for financial institution employees. At present the Financial institution provides employees 26 days’ annual depart along with public holidays. In the course of the first half of the nineteenth century, the depart entitlement different broadly – at occasions much more beneficiant than immediately and at different occasions a lot much less so. Which 12 months provided the least depart entitlements?
Right. In 1834 the Financial institution provided 4 days (Might Day, All Saints Day, Good Friday, and Christmas Day). In 1808 the Financial institution provided 44 days (saints’ days and spiritual festivals), in 1828 it provided 33 days (saints’ days and spiritual festivals), and in 1850 provided 15–21 days relying on service.
Sources: David Kynaston, ‘Until Time’s Final Sand: A Historical past of the Financial institution of England 1694–2013’; H. Cunningham, ‘The Cambridge Social Historical past of Britain 1750–1950’.
7) (Presents) Which of those items has Governor Andrew Bailey obtained throughout his time period of workplace?
Supply: ‘Bank of England‘.
Incorrect
8) (Financial Geography) Which nation has featured a snowflake design on certainly one of its banknotes?
Supply: ‘Norges Bank‘.
9) (Foreign money) Which legendary creature often seems on Roman cash, although extra generally related to historical Greek coinage?
Right. Whereas Pegasus, the winged horse, is extra famously related to Greek cash, reminiscent of these of Corinth, the winged horse does seem on uncommon events in Roman coinage, usually in mythological or creative contexts quite than for army symbolism.
Supply: ‘Roman Cash and Their Values’ by David Sear (and Greek numismatics for broader context).
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