European Central Bank

Climate capitalists

10/18/2024 European Central Bank Central banks

Firms’ perceived cost of green capital has decreased since the rise of sustainable investing. Green and brown firms perceived their cost of capital to be the same before 2016, but after the post-2016 surge in sustainable investing, green firms perceived their cost of capital to be on average 1 percentage point lower. This difference has widened as sustainable investing has intensified. Within some of the largest energy and utility firms, managers have started applying a lower cost of capital to greener divisions.

Monetary policy and growth-at-risk: the role of institutional quality

10/18/2024 European Central Bank Central banks

This paper analyses how country-specific institutional quality shapes the impact of monetary policy on downside risks to GDP growth in the euro area. Using identified high-frequency shocks in a growth-at-risk framework, we show that monetary policy has a higher impact on downside risks in the short term than in the medium term. However, this result for the euro area average hides significant heterogeneity across countries. In economies with weak institutional quality, medium-term growth risks increase substantially following contractionary monetary policy shocks.

Monetary and fiscal policy interactions: risks to price stability in times of high government debt

10/08/2024 European Central Bank Central banks

The change in macroeconomic conditions since the ECB’s strategy review in 2021 towards an environment characterised by above-target inflation, high interest rates, and renewed concerns about elevated government debt has been a vocal reminder of the intricate interdependencies between monetary and fiscal policies. Against this background, our paper reviews the literature on how central banks’ ability to maintain price stability is shaped by their interactions with fiscal policy and the state of the economy.

Capital requirements in Pillar 1 or Pillar 2: does it matter for market discipline?

10/07/2024 European Central Bank Central banks

The results of this paper provide empirical evidence that regulatory capital ratios drive bank Credit Default Swaps (CDS) and that markets react more to changes in capital requirements if implemented via direct adjustments to Pillar 1 risk weights than imposed as a percentage of Risk-Weighted Assets (RWAs) under Pillar 2. In other words, market discipline on bank capital adequacy is sensitive to the composition of the capital requirement stack.

Stablecoins, money market funds and monetary policy

10/07/2024 European Central Bank Central banks

Using a new series of crypto shocks, we document that money market funds’ (MMF) assets under management, and traditional financial market variables more broadly, do not react to crypto shocks, whereas stablecoin market capitalization does. U.S. monetary policy shocks, in contrast, drive developments in both crypto and traditional markets. Crucially, the reaction of MMF assets and stablecoin market capitalization to monetary policy shocks is different: while prime-MMF assets rise after a monetary policy tightening, stablecoin market capitalization declines.

How income expectations adjust to inflation – a consumers’ expectations-revealed pass-through

10/02/2024 European Central Bank Central banks

We use inflation and income growth expectations from the ECB Consumer Expectations Survey to measure the subjective expected pass-through of inflation to income in the main euro area countries. By aggregating consumers’ responses to probabilistic questions, we obtain significantly higher estimates of the pass-through than those obtained from micro data. Our methodology allows one to examine how the pass-through varies along the probability distribution of expected inflation, which turns out to be particularly large for moderate inflation expectations.

Unraveling the drivers of energy-saving technical change

10/01/2024 European Central Bank Central banks

We explore the increasing divergence between economic growth and energy consumption through energy-saving technical progress. Proposing a new measure of energy-saving technology, we study the underlying drivers in a semi-structural model of the U.S. economy. Our analysis shows that energy price shocks reduce consumption and stimulate energy-saving innovation, but also cause economic downturns and crowd out other innovations. Only energy-saving technology shocks can explain the negative co-movement between output and energy use.

The inflationary consequences of prioritising central bank profits

10/01/2024 European Central Bank Central banks

This paper examines the impact of rising interest rates on central bank profitability. Using a stylized income model, we demonstrate that changes in interest rates in combination with expansive balance sheet policies introduce a cyclical component into the central bank’s profit and loss statement. Ourfindings reveal, however, that while the interplay of such policies may dampen short-term profitability if interest rates rise, they do not undermine a central bank’s financial strength, because higher interest rates also raise the value of future seigniorage income.

Asymmetries in the transmission of monetary policy shocks over the business cycle: a Bayesian Quantile Factor Augmented VAR

09/24/2024 European Central Bank Central banks

This paper introduces a Bayesian Quantile Factor Augmented VAR (BQFAVAR) to examine the asymmetric effects of monetary policy throughout the business cycle. Monte Carlo experiments demonstrate that the model effectively captures non-linearities in impulse responses. Analysis of aggregate responses to a contractionary monetary policy shock reveals that financial variables and industrial production exhibit more pronounced impacts during recessions compared to expansions, aligning with predictions from the ’financial accelerator’ propagation mechanism literature.

Consumer demand for central bank digital currency as a means of payment

09/18/2024 European Central Bank Central banks

What factors could drive transactional demand for central bank digital currency (CBDC)? We analyse payment survey data to arrive at a framework for understanding the role of adoption frictions and design strategies in shaping CBDC demand. The results of our analysis show that, while consumers may initially prefer to use more traditional payment methods, a design tailored to their specific needs could significantly increase CBDC uptake. Raising awareness and capitalising on network effects could also boost demand for CBDC.

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