Interest Rates and the Channels of Monetary Transmission


Book Description

The monetary transmission mechanism describes the channels through which changes in monetary policy affect the policy target, price inflation. Understanding the transmission mechanism is thus central to the successful conduct of monetary policy. This paper uses a Vector AutoRegressive (VAR) methodology to uncover a number of stylised features of the monetary transmission process in the UK. In particular, close attention is paid to the role played by money and credit as intermediate channels. The possibility that the transmission mechanism may differ across sectors is allowed for by estimating separate VARs for the personal and corporate sectors. Three policy conclusions emerge. First, as suggested by Classical theory, monetary policy is output neutral over the longer term. Second, the lags between changes in monetary policy and its effect upon prices are lengthy (at least 18 months). And third, that aggregate measures of money and credit may provide blurred signals of the impact of monetary policy in final variables. Sectoral measures of bank deposits (for companies) and bank credit (for persons) provide the more timely intermediate indicators.







Monetary Policy Transmission in Emerging Markets and Developing Economies


Book Description

Central banks in emerging and developing economies (EMDEs) have been modernizing their monetary policy frameworks, often moving toward inflation targeting (IT). However, questions regarding the strength of monetary policy transmission from interest rates to inflation and output have often stalled progress. We conduct a novel empirical analysis using Jordà’s (2005) approach for 40 EMDEs to shed a light on monetary transmission in these countries. We find that interest rate hikes reduce output growth and inflation, once we explicitly account for the behavior of the exchange rate. Having a modern monetary policy framework—adopting IT and independent and transparent central banks—matters more for monetary transmission than financial development.




Aspects of the Monetary Transmission Mechanism Under Exchange Rate Targeting


Book Description

This paper examines monetary transmission in France using the vector autoregression methodology. Interest rates are decomposed into external and domestic components, and a nonrecursive contemporaneous structure is used to identify the system. Innovations in the external component are found to have a significant impact on economic activity, while innovations in the domestic premium have a statistically negligible effect, suggesting that interest rate hikes in defense of the franc may have had a smaller impact on the economy than usually thought. The paper also discusses some implications of Economic and Monetary Union and provides evidence concerning the importance of the credit channel in France.




Inflation Expectations


Book Description

Inflation is regarded by the many as a menace that damages business and can only make life worse for households. Keeping it low depends critically on ensuring that firms and workers expect it to be low. So expectations of inflation are a key influence on national economic welfare. This collection pulls together a galaxy of world experts (including Roy Batchelor, Richard Curtin and Staffan Linden) on inflation expectations to debate different aspects of the issues involved. The main focus of the volume is on likely inflation developments. A number of factors have led practitioners and academic observers of monetary policy to place increasing emphasis recently on inflation expectations. One is the spread of inflation targeting, invented in New Zealand over 15 years ago, but now encompassing many important economies including Brazil, Canada, Israel and Great Britain. Even more significantly, the European Central Bank, the Bank of Japan and the United States Federal Bank are the leading members of another group of monetary institutions all considering or implementing moves in the same direction. A second is the large reduction in actual inflation that has been observed in most countries over the past decade or so. These considerations underscore the critical – and largely underrecognized - importance of inflation expectations. They emphasize the importance of the issues, and the great need for a volume that offers a clear, systematic treatment of them. This book, under the steely editorship of Peter Sinclair, should prove very important for policy makers and monetary economists alike.







Negative Interest Rate Policy (NIRP)


Book Description

More than two years ago the European Central Bank (ECB) adopted a negative interest rate policy (NIRP) to achieve its price stability objective. Negative interest rates have so far supported easier financial conditions and contributed to a modest expansion in credit, demonstrating that the zero lower bound is less binding than previously thought. However, interest rate cuts also weigh on bank profitability. Substantial rate cuts may at some point outweigh the benefits from higher asset values and stronger aggregate demand. Further monetary accommodation may need to rely more on credit easing and an expansion of the ECB’s balance sheet rather than substantial additional reductions in the policy rate.




Monetary Policy Transmission in the Euro Area


Book Description

This 2003 book offers the most systematic analysis available of the impact of European Central Bank monetary policy on the national economies of the Eurozone. Analysing macro and micro-economic evidence, with chapters by central bank economists, including a discussion chapter by eminent macroeconomists, it is an essential contribution to research on the subject.




The New Monetary Policy


Book Description

. . . this book provides a useful overview of the challenges facing the IT policy framework, both by pointing to the limitations of the underlying theory and, more importantly, by outlining the importance of a transparent policy framework for anchoring expectations. . . the book should be of interest to all central bankers and students of monetary policy. Colin Rogers, Economic Record Recent developments in macroeconomic and monetary thinking have given a new impetus to the management of the economy. The use of monetary policy by way of manipulating the rate of interest to affect inflation is now well accepted by both academic economists and central bank practitioners. Beginning with an assessment of new thinking in macroeconomics and monetary theory, this book suggests that many countries have adopted the New Consensus Monetary Policy since the early 1990s in an attempt to reduce inflation to low levels. It goes on to illustrate that the explicit control of the money supply, which was fashionable in the 1970s and 1980s in the UK, US, Europe and elsewhere, was abandoned in favour of monetary rules that focus on interest rate manipulation by the central bank. The objective of these rules is to achieve specific, or a range of, inflation targets. Bringing together a distinguished cast of international contributors, this book presents a collection of papers, which discuss the following issues amongst others: the stability of the macroeconomic equilibrium monetary policy divergences in the Euro area stock market prices the US post- new economy bubble the information economy inflation targeting. This useful analysis of New Consensus Monetary Policy will be of great interest to financial economists and international monetary economists, as well as students and scholars of macroeconomics and finance.




Interest Rate Channel of Monetary Transmission Mechanism


Book Description

The interest rate channel of monetary transmission is the link through which variations in Central Bank real interest rates influence aggregate output and prices. To check fluctuation in prices, the Central Bank of Nigeria has kept the monetary policy rate stable at 12 percent for the past three years with the view that stability in interest rates will provide the needed incentive for domestic investment to thrive. The long run linkage between real interest rates, inflation and output in a developing country like Nigeria calls for empirical investigation. This study tests the interest rate channel of monetary transmission in Nigeria to enable us establish the extent of stickiness in interest rates in realizing macroeconomic policy goals. The study made use of co-integration and error correction mechanisms in investigating the channel through which nominal interest rates influence long run economic aggregates. The study made use of secondary time series data with quarterly frequency from Q1:1996 to 2013:Q3. Results obtained would help track the speed with which monetary policy changes transmits to the economy and the speed of adjustment from theshort run to the long run.