In this paper, we investigate whether French consumers have modified their preferences towards environmentally-friendly vehicles between 2003 and 2008. We estimate a model of demand for automobiles incorporating both consumers' heterogeneity and CO2 emissions of the vehicles. Our results show...

This paper examines the impact of bank consolidation on mortgage rates in order to evaluate the extent to which mortgage markets are competitive. Mortgage markets are decentralized and so rates are determined through a search and negotiation process. The primary effect of a merger therefore is...

We construct a multi-country affine term structure model that contains unspanned macroeconomic and foreign exchange risks. The canonical version of the model is derived and is shown to be easy to estimate. We show that it is important to impose restrictions (including global asset pricing, carry...

Stylized facts on U.S. output and interest rates have so far proved hard to match with simple DSGE models. I estimate covariances between output, nominal and real interest rate conditional on structural shocks, since such evidence has largely been lacking in previous discussions of the...

Das vorliegende Papier wirft die Frage auf, ob Grundrechte institutioneller Anleger und Sparer durch die Negativ- bzw. Niedrigzinspolitik der EZB, insbesondere durch das Staatsanleihenkaufprogramm (Quantitative Easing) verletzt sind. Drei Aspekte werden aus rechtlicher Sicht diskutiert: Ist die...

Most of the available monthly interest data series consist of monthlyaverages of daily observations. It is well-known that this averaging introduces spurious autocorrelation effectsin the first differences of the series. It isexactly this differenced series we are interested in when...

We investigate the implications for the setting of interest rateswhen monetary policy decisions are taken by a committee, in whicha subset of members may meet prior to the voting in the committeeand therefore has the possibility to reach consensus ex ante to voteunanimously ex post. We allow for...