In the presence of high uncertainty and limited experience, can observing the actions of other acquiring predecessors help firms make better acquisition decisions? Using a sample of cross-border M&As conducted by US acquirers in developing countries, we document a positive and significant...

Disinflationary episodes are a valuable source of information for economic agents trying to learn about the economy. In this paper we are particularly interested in how policymakers can themselves learn by disinflating. The approach differs from the existing literature, which typically focuses...

Expectations about the future are central for determination of current macroeconomic outcomes and the formulation of monetary policy. Recent literature has explored ways for supplementing the benchmark of rational expectations with explicit models of expectations formation that rely on...

In this paper, we examine the incentives for central bank activism and caution in a two-country open-economy model with uncertainty and learning. We find that the presence of a strategic interaction between the home and foreign central banks creates an additional motivation for caution in...

In this paper we incorporate the term structure of interest rates into a standard inflation forecast targeting framework. Learning about the transmission process of monetary policy is introduced by having heterogeneous agents – ie central bank and private agents – who have different...

In this paper we analyse disinflation policy in two environments. In the first, the central bank has perfect knowledge, in the sense that it understands and observes the process by which private sector inflation expectations are generated; in the second, the central bank has to learn the private...

This paper examines a class of interest rate rules that respond to public expectations and to lagged variables. Varying levels of commitment correspond to varying degrees of response to lagged output and targeting of the price level. If the response rises (unintentionally) above the optimal...

We study a many-country endogenous growth model in which decisions about innovation and new investment are influenced by growth expectations. Adaptive learning dynamics determine the country-specific short-run transition paths. The countries differ in basic structural parameters and may impose...

We ask the question: Does it matter whether expections on monetary policy are heterogeneous across agents in the economy? We tackle this issue with the aid of a dynamic general equilibrium model with nominal rigidities. The most important features of the model include consumption/saving...