After almost four decades of price stability, inflation has recently approached historical highs. Initially driven by global energy and food price increases, the magnitude of the surge in inflation caught central banks and markets by surprise. Price pressures are now increasingly broadening to...

We assume that central banks can control inflation so that inflation rates reflect the preferences of the central bank council.The hypothesis to be tested is that these preferences depend on the central bankers? educational and/or professional background. In a panel data analysis for the euro...

In Africa, a number of countries like South Africa have adopted inflation targeting. In Nigeria, different monetary policy regimes have been adopted over the years with rather unsatisfactory success. This study examines inflation targeting in Nigeria and South Africa, using fully modified least...

This paper reviews the rationale for quantitative easing when central bank policy rates reach near zero levels in light of recent announcements regarding direct asset purchases by the Bank of England, the Bank of Japan, the U.S. Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank. Empirical evidence...

Excessive inflation is usually attributed to the lack of central bank’s credibility. In this context, most of the literature considers transparency a means to establish central bank’s credibility. The contribution of this paper is twofold. First, it shows that, even in the absence of...

This paper studies monetary policy committee transparency (MPCT) based on a new index that measures central bankers' educational and professional backgrounds as disclosed through central bank websites. Based on a novel cross-sectional data set covering 75 central banks, we investigate the...

Central banks have been made more independent in many countries. A common rationale has been the existence of a credibility (or lack-of-trust) problem for monetary policy. This indicates a possible and until now unexplored link between social trust and central-bank independence. Our empirical...

We analyze empirical links between the perceived tail-risk of inflation, the policy rate, longer-term interest rates, and equity prices in the U.S. Their simultaneous changes enable us to distinguish between a systematic and "exogenous" response to monetary-policy news. And, those tail...

Based on its outward-oriented development strategy, respectable growth, increased integration into world trade and financial markets, and imperfect though vibrant and wide-based democracy, Turkey is often cited as a development model for other countries in the region and elsewhere. Countering...