This paper examines the effect of macroeconomic news announcements (MNA) on the stock market. Stocks exhibit a strong positive response to major MNA: 1 standard deviation of MNA surprise causes 11-25 bps higher returns. This response is highly time-varying and is weaker during periods of high...

The key insight from this analysis is that monetary policy should be responding more to negative shocks than positive shocks: optimal monetary policy is asymmetric. Moreover, if we take the stance that asset prices indicate a high cost of exposure to long-run risks, this has very interesting...