We investigate optimal horizons for targeting inflation in response to different shocks and their properties under alternative preferences of an inflation-targeting central bank. Our analysis is based on a well specified macroeconometric model of Norway, but we examine how alternative...

In this paper, we study the statistical relationship between money and prices in Argentina during the last quarter of the 20th century. We first look at the unit root characteristics of the series which suggest dividing the whole sample into two sub-samples: 1976 to 1989 and 1991 to 2001, as...

We examine the impact of public information in an economy where agents also have diverse private information. Our work builds on seminal contributions by Townsend (1983) and Phelps (1983), and more recently Woodford (2002), which emphasized the importance of higher-order beliefs – that is,...

There are two crucial conditions for cross-sectional aggregation of AR(1) parameters to produce long memory: 1) heterogeneity and 2) proximity to the unit root. We analyze role of moments, namely the mean and variance, of the distribution of the AR(1) coefficients in generating long memory. The...

In most of the recent macroeconomics literature, the sticky reaction of prices in response to changes in aggregate conditions has been modelled following the highly influential contribution of Calvo (1983). However, this approach has difficulties in accounting for some well-established stylized...

The conventional view is that a monetary policy shock has both supply-side and demand-side effects, at least in the short run. Barth and Ramey (2001) show that the supply-side effect of a monetary policy shock may be greater than the demand-side effect. We argue that it is crucial for monetary...

We examine the high-frequency response of the rand-dollar nominal rate within ten-minute intervals around five minutes before, five minutes after) official inflation announcements, and show that the rand appreciates (respectively, depreciates) on impact when inflation is higher (respectively,...

The Dutch disease argument suggests that in commodity exporting countries "overvaluation" of the currency due to increases in commodity prices harms manufacturing even though the economy as a whole benefits, led by the booming natural resources sector. The relationship between the real exchange...

This paper constructs a number of possible core measures of annual inflation using Singular Spectrum Analysis (SSA). Annual inflation is decomposed into its trend, oscillating and noise components in order to develop an understanding of the trend and cyclicality in South African headline...

How detrimental is inflation to growth in South Africa? At what level? Motivated by the adoption of inflation targeting by many countries, this paper sets out to empirically determine the threshold level of inflation in South Africa. This study adopts quarterly time series data spanning over the...