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...

According to most academics and policymakers, transparency in monetary policymaking is desirable. I examine this proposition in a small theoretical model emphasizing forwardlooking private sector behavior. Transparency makes it easier for price setters to infer the central bank's future policy...

This paper presents empirical evidence on the behaviour of interbank lending in Germany after a monetary policy impulse. Our VAR analysis shows that following a monetary contraction, the banking system as a whole attracts additional funds from foreign banks. Whereas small cooperative and savings...

Assets have "indirect liquidity" if they cannot be used as media of exchange, but can be traded to obtain a medium of exchange (money) and thereby inherit monetary properties. This essay describes a simple dynamic model of indirect asset liquidity, provides closed form solutions for real and...