[...]This paper traces the evolution of Fedwire fromtwelve separate payment operations, linked only by aninterdistrict communications arrangement, to a more unifiedand efficient system. Our account highlights both thedifficulties the Federal Reserve encountered as it soughtto standardize and...

The paper evaluates the performance of three popular monetary policy rules when the central bank is learning aboutthe parameter values of a simple New Keynesian model. The three policies are: (1) the optimal non-inertial rule; (2)the optimal history-dependent rule; (3) the optimal price-level...

This paper studies an advantage of commitment over discretion when a central bankobserves only noisy measures of current inflation and output, in the context of an optimizingmodel with nominal-price stickiness. Under a commitment regime, if current policy turns outto be too expansionary...

This paper considers the determination of aggregate price level under dispersed information.A Central Bank sets policy in response to its noisy measure of the price level, andeach agent makes its decisions by observing a subset of data. Information revealed to theagents and the bank is...

The global financial crisis that began in mid-2007 has renewedconcerns about financial instability and focused attention onthe fundamental role of central banks in preventing andmanaging systemic crises. In response to the turmoil, centralbanks have made extensive use of both new and existing...

In this paper, we assess the effects of changes to the primarycredit facility since August 2007 by performing out-of-samplesimulations based on a model developed by Artuç andDemiralp (2008). Our results are highly consistent with thepredictions of our 2008 study—that is, the revised...

Monetary policy has traditionally been viewed as theprocess by which a central bank uses its influence overthe supply of money to promote its economic objectives. Forexample, Milton Friedman (1959, p. 24) defined the tools ofmonetary policy to be those “powers that enable the [FederalReserve]...