Remarks by OFR Acting Director James Martin to the Financial Stability Oversight Council
Published: July 28, 2023
As prepared for delivery
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Thank you, Secretary Yellen. One year ago, I spoke before the Council about a cutting-edge pilot the OFR was set to launch—the OFR’s Climate Data and Analytics Hub. We built the Hub, in part, in response to a request from the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, who asked us if they could leverage the OFR’s data-hosting and analytical capabilities to support research on climate-related financial risk. The resulting pilot also advanced President Biden’s Executive Order on Climate-related Financial Risks, which directed the OFR to assist this Council in assessing and identifying climate-related risks to financial stability.
This request also presented an opportunity for the OFR to test its ability to create a scalable model of a data hub environment that we can all use for research on various financial stability topics.
Given the success of the pilot, the OFR announced in April that we were moving forward with the development of an expanded and enhanced version of the Climate Hub. And today, I am pleased to announce that the OFR has officially launched the Joint Analysis Data Environment—or JADE, for short.
JADE is an OFR-hosted platform designed for FSOC agencies to access, integrate, and jointly analyze data. The secure cloud-based environment provides access to analysis-ready data, analytical software, and high-performance computing tools.
While climate-related financial risk is the first use case the FSOC has identified for JADE, the OFR designed JADE to be responsive to the evolving nature of risks to financial-stability.
The financial system faces threats from multiple sources. These threats do not adhere to regulatory boundaries. They travel from one regulated space to another. Therefore, the stability of the financial system is best promoted when regulators work together. Key to this collaboration is the ability to not only access data, but the tools to integrate and analyze it, and ultimately produce interdisciplinary research that pinpoints where risks are and where they may go. JADE provides the platform to do just that.
I am immensely proud of all our staff and their efforts in contributing to this important work.
Thank you, again, for allowing me the opportunity to discuss the OFR’s efforts on behalf of the Council.