Making the most of big data - Central Banking

The concept of big data can be hard to pin down – how would you define it? Per Nymand-Andersen: Big data can be defined as a source of information and intelligence resulting from the recording of operations, or from the combination of such records. There are many examples of recorded operations – records of supermarket purchases, robot and sensor information in production processes, satellite sensors, images, as well as behaviour, event and opinion-driven records from search engines, including information from social media and speech recognition tools. The list seems endless, with more and more information becoming public and digital as a result – for example, the use of credit and debit payments, trading and settlement platforms, and housing, health, education and work-related records. Should central banks take advantage of big data?