The current pandemic and the accompanying economic lockdowns have led to the deepest economic downturn since the Great Depression. Fiscal and monetary authorities have acted in kind, with unprecedented stimulus and expansion of balance sheets. The Bank of Canada, for its part, dropped the...

The first part of this paper outlines the concept of democratic accountability of central banks, and compares the legal accountability of the ECB with some other central banks (Bank of Canada, Bank of Japan, Bank of England and the Federal Reserve System). In the second part, we present a theory...

The debate about Canadian-U.S. monetary integration is surveyed. The choice is among overall monetary orders,rather than exchange rate regimes and questions of policy credibility and political accountability are crucial. Canada's recent economic performance under inflation targets, and arguments...

The U.S. Federal Reserve responded to the great recession by reducing policy rates to the effective lower bound. In order to provide further monetary stimulus, they subsequently conducted large-scale asset purchases, quadrupling their balance sheet in the process. We assess the international...

We explain Canadian target rate decisions using macroeconomic variables as well as Bank of Canada (BOC) and Federal Reserve (Fed) communication indicators. Econometrically, we employ an ordered probit model of a Taylor rule to explain and predict 60 target rate decisions between 1998 and 2006....

This paper deals with two interrelated issues. First, how has the international experience with monetary policy changed over the past decade or so? The present Commentary considers the consequences of the spread of inflation control regimes worldwide in shaping where Canada goes from here after...

The COVID-19 pandemic placed unprecedented strain on the global financial system. We describe how the Bank of Canada responded to the rapidly deteriorating liquidity in core Canadian fixed-income markets. We also describe how market functioning improved after the Bank intervened. The Bank...

In this Commentary, we document the nature of the Bank of Canada's current monetary policy regime by focusing on the following questions: what are the historical determinants of the Canadian–US dollar nominal exchange rate, and can they be used in real-time forecasting applications?We find...

Historically high levels of private and public debt coupled with already very low short-term interest rates appear to limit the options for stimulative monetary policy in many advanced economies today. One option that has not yet been considered is monetary financing by central banks to boost...