Good morning [%first_name |Dear Reader%],

It’s been an unusually warm new year; the warmest Bengaluru January in my memory. (I could be off degree-wise, IMD data isn’t public yet. But parts of India did indeed record the warmest November since 1901.)

So when, on the last day of 2022, Taiwan’s central bank spoke of the risk of “green swan” events triggering a financial crisis, and its own decision to factor this into its economic planning, it was merely following what other central banks have already acknowledged. 

Incidentally, last week was also when two potential green swans were unveiled. 

But wait, before I confuse you, some explanation is in order. 

“Green swan” is a relatively recent term as such things go—coined by a group of academicians in their January 2020 report for the Bank of International Settlements (BIS). It’s derived from the term “Black Swan”, coined and made popular by writer and risk analyst Nassim Nicholas Taleb in his 2007 book The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable.