This paper studies how low interest rates weaken the short-run transmission of monetary policy and contract the long-run supply of bank credit. As U.S. bond rates have fallen, the pass-through of monetary shocks to loan and deposit rates has weakened while the spread on U.S. bank loans has...

In most countries, the supply of paper money is controlled by a state institution. This paper provides an explanation for why such an arrangement is typically chosen. I use a deterministic matching model with a continuum of agents where enforcement is limited and where some agents produce public...

In this paper I show that a lax anti-counterfeiting policy is inconsistent with price stability. I use a deterministic matching model with no commitment and no enforcement. An intrinsically worthless but perfectly durable object called a ‘note’ can be produced by banks at a given cost, but...

This paper examines the degree of fragmentation in the Euro overnight unsecured money market during the period June 2008 – August 2013 using interbank loans constructed from payments data. After controlling for cross-country differences in bank risk, we document several episodes of significant...

This paper analyses in a unified framework the twin issues of the appropriate horizon for achieving price stability in the face of unexpected disturbances and the choice of a price level versus an inflation objective. Using a small estimated forward-looking model of the euro area economy, the...

This paper investigates whether monetary policy impulses have asymmetric effects on output growth in seven countries of the euro area (Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Austria, Belgium and the Netherlands). First, it is shown that these seven countries share the same business cycle. Next, strong...

We first estimate the effects of an euro area-wide monetary policy change on output growth in eleven industries of seven euro area countries over the period 1980-1998. On average the negative effect of an interest rate tightening on output is significantly greater in recessions than in booms....

This paper develops and estimates a stochastic dynamic general equilibrium (SDGE) model with sticky prices and wages for the euro area. The model incorporates various other features such as habit formation, costs of adjustment in capital accumulation and variable capacity utilisation. It is...

This paper uses the variability of money market rates to compare the conduct of the central bank's key market operation as a fixed-rate tender (FRT) or a variable-rate tender (VRT). Nowadays, leading central banks generally use FRTs or other approaches (e.g. target rates) which yield step...

This paper presents evidence on the lag between monetary policy actions and the response of inflation in the euro area as a whole as well as in Germany, Italy and France. In line with previous findings for the US and the UK, results here show that this lag is longer than one year both in the...