The recent financial crisis has been characterized by unprecedented monetary policy interventions of central banks with the intention to stabilize financial markets and the real economy. This paper sheds light on the actual impact of monetary policy on stock liquidity and thereby addresses its...

It is often argued that fiscal stabilisation in the euro area compares unfavourably with the US, not least because of the perceived limitations of the Stability and Growth Pact. This paper qualifies this perception by taking a closer look at fiscal policy making since the mid-1990s. It examines...

This paper examines whether illiquidity is a determinant of monthly stock returns in the German market. Estimating time-series and cross-sectional models, we investigate the impact of illiquidity both on market returns and on individual stock returns. Illiquidity is approximated by five measures...

We show that search volume on Google not only serves as an intuitive proxy for overall firm recognition, but also captures the attention of stock market investors. Our results suggest that an increase in search queries is associated with a rise in trading activity and stock liquidity. We...

The global financial and economic crisis has revived the debate in the academic literature and in policy circles about the size and effectiveness of automatic fiscal stabilizers. Especially in the euro area where monetary policy is centralized and discretionary fiscal policy making is...

We show that the search volume on Google not only serves as an intuitive proxy for overall recognition in a firm, but also captures the attention of stock market investors. Our results suggest that an increase in search queries is associated with a rise in trading activity and stock liquidity....

Real-time estimates of potential output are used for the calculation of the cyclically-adjusted budget balance, one of the main indicators in the assessment of the fiscal performance of EU Member States. The estimation of potential output involves a decomposition of actual output into a cyclical...

The model presented in the paper makes use of the portfolio theory as well as its econometric transposition for estimating the yield structure of different financial-asset investments. As the supply of financial assets is not assumed to be perfectly elastic the demand for alternative assets...

Theoretical arguments and empirical evidence are presented to prove the poor quality of the structural budget balance in assessing the effectiveness of budget consolidation efforts. Changes in the structural budget balance currently used as an indicator of fiscal stance give a significantly...

This paper examines economic policy interactions in the Economic and Monetary Union when the assessment of cyclical conditions in real time is surrounded by uncertainty. On the basis of a simple stylised model it shows that with a Nash-type of interaction different views about the output gap on...