The establishment of the European Central Bank (ECB) presents a rare opportunity to define the operations of a central … bank with no prior track record. Before the ECB specifies an, as yet undefined, operational target this paper asks what … be problematic. The ECB must be accountable and the contracting approach may be useful, but being seen to ‘say’ and ‘do …

(ECB) to study optimal monetary policy in the Euro area (for instance Smets and Wouters, 2004a, 2004b) typically assume … price shocks. Two-country models exist at the ECB (e.g. de Walque, Smets, Wouters, 2005) but they overlook asset price … remained true for the ECB, at least so far. Using closed economy models to analyze monetary policy in the Euro is thus …

public. Using the case of the European Central Bank (ECB), the paper analyses the favorableness with which monetary policy … information communicated by the ECB. There are, however, also indications of a critical monitoring role assumed by the media …, which tends to report more negatively on ECB policy decisions when inflation exceeds the inflation target. …

simple interest rate rule is employed to interpret ECB policy since 1999. An evaluation of alternative policy rules across 11 … growth as the one used to interpret ECB policy is quite robust as long as it responds to current outcomes of these variables. …

problem is not the fault of the ECB, but is due to having a single nominal interest rate. As a result, the evidence reveals …

This paper describes the way in which the European Central Bank (ECB), the Federal Reserve and the Bank of England …