We explore the effectiveness and balance of benefits and costs of so-called "unconventional" monetary policy measures extensively implemented in the wake of the financial crisis: balance sheet policies (commonly termed "quantitative easing"), forward guidance and negative policy rates. Our...

This paper contributes to a deeper understanding of macroeconomic outcomes to financial market disturbances and the central bank’s role in financial stability, by using Bayesian VAR (BVAR) models. We document that a shock that increases credit to non-financial sector leads to a persistent...

The paper summarizes some of the main findings about domestic monetary policy from my three volume history. It finds that the Federal Open Market Committee concentrates excessively on the very near-term and rarely discusses medium or long-term implications. Also it has never agreed on a model...

There is a wide consensus that the existence of structural rigidities in the Eurozone reduces the effectiveness of the ECB's monetary policies. In order to test this "ECB-handicap" hypothesis, we perform a meta-analysis of the effects of monetary policies in the US and the Eurozone countries....

Central Bank participants at the BIS 2008 Open Economies Meeting in Punta del Este, Uruguay, discussed trends in capital flows since 2003 and their monetary and financial stability implications. Capital flows appear to be more benign today than in the past, partly because of a greater share of...

This paper contributes to a fuller understanding of macroeconomic outcomes to financial market disturbances and the central bank’s role in financial stability. Our two major contributions are conceptual and econometric. Conceptually, we introduce phases of the business cycle and...

Factor-augmented VARs (FAVARs) have combined standard VARs with factor analysis to exploit large data sets in the study of monetary policy. FAVARs enjoy a number of advantages over VARs: they allow a better identification of the monetary policy shock; they can avoid the use of a single variable...

Although Central Banks have pursued the same objectives throughout their existence, primarily price and financial stability, the interpretation of their role in doing so has varied. We identify three stable epochs, when such interpretations had stabilised, ie: 1.The Victorian era, 1840s to 1914; 2....

The recent global financial crisis has led central banks to rely heavily on "unconventional" monetary policies. This alternative approach to policy has generated much discussion and a heated and at times confusing debate. The debate has been complicated by the use of different definitions and...

I suggest a new channel through which central bank asset purchase programs could have effects on asset prices: The outside option channel. After the global financial crisis, central banks have widened the variety of assets they can purchase. Secondary markets for the majority of the newly...