The traditional view of the monetary transmission mechanism rests on the premise that the Federal Reserve (Fed) controls the level of the Federal funds rate via open market operations and the liquidity effect. By contrast, this paper argues that the Fed also manipulates the Federal funds rate...

The proposition that inflation expectations can be extracted as inflation predictions from the government bond yield curve has been tested, with partially positive results, using data from the United States and European countries. Despite the abundance of empirical studies of the proposition,...

Summary Nonlinear dynamics in the term structure of German interest rates resulting from heterogenous transaction costs in the money market are analysed by means of the smooth transition technique introduced by Granger and Teräsvirta (1993). Tests for linearity, specific functional forms and...

Abstract We apply a structural pricing model to bond market data in order to estimate the default risk for Argentina in 2000/2001. The model explicitly considers short-term and long-term debt service payments and their dependencies by employing compound option theory. In this way, it is possible...

In the first chapter, I estimate dynamic factors from the term structure of credit spreads and the term structure of equity option implied volatilities, and I provide a comprehensive characterization of the dynamic relationships among those credit spread factors and equity volatility factors. I...

This dissertation investigates whether U.S. commercial banks substitute fee-based income for the decreases in net interest income brought about by a flattening term structure of interest rates. Given the current economic climate, the fee-based activity of interest is asset securitization, though...

Dynamic term structure models (DTSMs) price interest rate derivatives based on the modelimplied fair values of the yield curve, ignoring any pricing residuals on the yield curve that are either from model approximations or market imperfections. In contrast, option pricing in practice often takes...

The volatility of interest rates is relevant for many financial applications. Under realistic assumptions the term structure of interest rate differentials provides an important prediction of the term structure of interest rates. This paper derives the term structure of differentials in a...

The process of international interest rate convergence for arbitrary terms (represented by the term structure of interest rate differentials) is derived in a model of a small open economy which faces a purely time-contingent exchange rate regime switch from flexible to fixed rates. Special...

Options with different maturities can be used to generate volatility estimates for non-overlapping future time intervals. This paper develops the term structure of volatility implied by corn futures options, and evaluates the informational content of the implied forward volatility as a predictor...