Asymmetric Taylor reaction functions of the ECB: An approach depending on the state of the economy

We introduce a new approach to estimate asymmetric Taylor reaction functions where asymmetries depend crucially on the state of the economy which is in the Taylor rule framework the combination of inflation and output deviations. Thus we categorize the sample into four subsamples which correspond to all possible combinations concerning inflation and output deviations. Moreover we introduce a quadratic term of inflation and the output gap in the estimation equation for each state in order to capture possible non-linearities within each state. The approach is tested using data for the ECB because the ECB has communicated an explicit inflation target.     

Monetary policy and asset prices in an open economy

This paper examines whether central banks should respond to asset price fluctuations in a two-country sticky price model. We compare a monetary policy rule that targets both domestic asset prices and foreign asset prices with several alternative monetary policy rules. This paper shows that this policy rule can produce preferable outcomes because the domestic central bank incorporates important information that both domestic and foreign asset prices possess into its monetary policy. Our model suggests that central banks should consider both domestic and foreign asset prices in a two country framework with asset price fluctuations.     

Housing, credit, and real activity cycles: Characteristics and comovement

This paper describes the characteristics and comovement of cycles in house prices, residential investment, credit, interest rates, and real activity in advanced economies during the past 25 years. Stylized facts and regularities are uncovered using a dynamic generalized factor model and spectral techniques. House price cycles are found to lead credit and real activity over the long term, while in the short to medium term the relationship varies across countries. Interest rates tend to lag other cycles at all time horizons. Although global factors are important, the US business cycle, housing cycle and interest rate cycle generally lead the respective cycles in other countries over all time horizons, while the US credit cycle leads mainly over the long term.     

Does money help predict inflation? An empirical assessment for Central Europe

This paper investigates the predictive ability of money for future inflation in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia. We construct monetary indicators similar to those the European Central Bank regularly uses for monetary analysis. We find in-sample evidence that money matters for future inflation at the policy horizons that central banks typically focus on, but our pseudo out-of-sample forecasting exercise shows that money does not in general improve the inflation forecasts vis-à-vis some benchmark models such as the autoregressive process. Since at least some models containing money improve the inflation forecasts in certain periods, we argue that money still serves as a useful cross-check for monetary policy analysis.     

Nonlinear effects of monetary policy on stock returns in a smooth transition autoregressive model

This paper employs smooth transition autoregressive (STAR) models to investigate the nonlinear effect of monetary policy on stock returns. The change in the Federal funds rate is used as an endogenous measure of monetary policy, and the growth rate of industrial production is also considered in the model. Our results show that the relationship between the monetary policy and excess returns on stock prices is positive and nonlinear. A decrease in the Federal funds rate causes a larger increase in excess returns if excess stock returns are located in the extreme low excess returns regime.     

A bootstrap algorithm for testing cointegration rank in VAR models in the presence of stationary variables

In this paper, a bootstrap algorithm for a reduced rank vector autoregressive (VAR) model which also includes stationary regressors, is analyzed. It is shown that the bootstrap distribution for estimating the rank converges to the distribution derived from the usual asymptotic framework. Because the asymptotic distribution will typically depend on unknown parameters, bootstrap distributions are of considerable interest in this context. The result of an application and some Monte Carlo experiments are also presented.     

A sight for sore eyes: Assessing the value of view and land use in the housing market

We apply a hedonic model to the Geneva–Switzerland rental market to assess the value of view from dwellings and of land uses around buildings. Using a geographic information system, we calculate three-dimensional view variables, accessibility and land use variables. To our knowledge, this is the first paper to develop precise view measures at the dwelling level, considering surrounding land uses, in an urban context and with a large sample of 13,000 observations. The results show that view of various environmental amenities and its size has a significant impact on rents. The estimated rent premium for a dwelling located in a neighbourhood with an extended surface of water can be as high as 3%, and a view of water-covered area can raise rent up to 57%.     

Determinants of European stock market integration

We analyse the determinants of stock market integration among EU member states for the period 1999–2007. First, we apply bivariate DCC-MGARCH models to extract dynamic conditional correlations between European stock markets, which are then explained by interest rate spreads, exchange rate risk, market capitalisation, and business cycle synchronisation in a pooled OLS model. By grouping the countries into euro area countries, “old” EU member states outside the euro area, and new EU member states, we also evaluate the impact of euro introduction and the European unification process on stock market integration. We find a significant trend toward more stock market integration, which is enhanced by the size of relative and absolute market capitalisation and hindered by foreign exchange risk between old member states and the euro area. Interest rate spreads and business cycle synchronisation are also significant factors in explaining equity market integration.     

Regulatory risk, market uncertainties, and firm financing choices: Evidence from U.S. Electricity Market Restructuring

Based on the universe of rate-regulated electric utilities in the U.S., we examine why firms alter their financing decisions when transitioning from a regulated to a competitive market regime. We find that the significant increase in regulatory risk after the passage of the Energy Policy Act, state-level restructuring legislations, and divestiture policies have reduced leverage by 15 percent. Policies that encouraged competition, and hence increased market uncertainty, lowered leverage by another 13 percent on average. The ability to exercise market power allowed some firms to counter this competitive threat. In aggregate, regulatory risk and market uncertainty variables reduce leverage between 24.6 and 26.7 percent. We also confirm findings in the literature that firms with higher profitability and higher asset growth have lower leverage, and those with more tangible assets are more levered. Firms with greater access to internal capital markets and those with a footloose customer segment use less debt, while those actively involved in trading power in the wholesale market use more debt.     

Asymmetric convergence in US financial credit default swap sector index markets

This study examines the asymmetric adjustments to the long-run equilibrium for credit default swap (CDS) sector indexes of three financial sectors – banking, financial services and insurance – in the presence of a threshold effect. The results of the momentum-threshold autoregression (M-TAR) models demonstrate that asymmetric cointegration exists for all pairs comprised of those three CDS indexes. The speeds of adjustment in the long-run are much higher in the case of adjustments from below the threshold than from above for all the pairs. The estimates of The MTAR-VEC models suggest that the dual CDS index return in each sector pair participates in the adjustment to equilibrium in the short- and long-run taken together. But in the long-run alone, only one of the two spreads in each pair participates. Policy implications are also provided.     

Volatility contagion: A range-based volatility approach

This article proposes a new approach to evaluate volatility contagion in financial markets. A time-varying logarithmic conditional autoregressive range model with the lognormal distribution (TVLCARR) is proposed to capture the possible smooth transition in the range process. Additionally, a smooth transition copula function is employed to detect the volatility contagion between financial markets. The approach proposed is applied to the stock markets of the G7 countries to investigate the volatility contagion due to the subprime mortgage crisis. Empirical evidence shows that volatility is contagious from the US market to several markets examined.     

Trade credit versus bank credit: Evidence from corporate inventory financing

In this study, I introduce capital market imperfections into a structure framework of inventory investments and investigate impacts of trade credit on firms’ inventory dynamics and analyze the relationship between trade credit and bank loans. As a result, firms end up using a mix of trade credit and bank loans. I find that the use of trade credit and bank credit can be either complements or substitutes. During tight monetary periods, trade credit operates mainly as a substitute for bank borrowing while during looser monetary episodes even when the economy is weak, trade credit and bank loans are dominated by a complementary effect.     

Foreign and domestic growth drivers in Eastern Europe

This paper analyses the growth effects of capital formation, exports and FDI as major, drivers of economic development in Eastern Europe. The fundamental innovations are, identified by empirically and theoretically motivated short- and long-run restrictions in, structural cointegrated vector autoregressions. Impulse responses and variance, decompositions reveal quite different growth effects in various Eastern European countries. Generally, a strong reliance on exports goes along with higher GDP, and FDI bears, substantial potential for fostering economic growth. It is shown that the recent worldwide, recession clearly hit Eastern Europe through the export channel, whereas the recovery is, mainly supported by positive demand shocks.     

A topological invariant for competitive markets

This paper summarizes the concepts of global cones and limited arbitrage introduced in Chichilnisky (Economic Theory, 1995, 5, 79–108), and the corresponding results establishing that limited arbitrage is necessary and sufficient for the existence of a competitive equilibrium and for the compactness of Pareto frontier (announced in Chichilnisky (American Economic Review, 1992, 84, 427–434, and Chichilnisky (Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society, 1993, 29, 189–207). Using the same global cones I extend my earlier results to encompass ‘mixed economies’ based on Chichilnisky (CORE Discussion Paper No. 9527, 1995). I introduce a topological invariant for competitive markets which deepens the concept of limited arbitrage. This invariant encodes exact information on the equilibria and on the social diversity of the economy and all its subeconomies, and predicts a failure of effective demand.     

Independent component analysis for realized volatility: Analysis of the stock market crash of 2008

This paper investigates the factors that drove the U.S. equity market returns from 2007 to early 2010. The period was highlighted by volatile energy and commodity prices, the collapse of insurance and banking firms, extreme implied volatility and a subsequent rally in the overall market. To extract the driving factors, we decompose the returns of the S&P500 sector ETFs into statistically independent signals using independent component analysis. We find that the generated factors have interesting financial interpretations and are consistent with the major economic themes of the period. We find that there are two sets of general market betas during the period along with a dominant factor for energy and materials sector. In addition, we find that the EGARCH model which accommodates asymmetric responses between returns and volatility can plausibly fit the high levels of variance during the crash. Finally, estimated correlations dropped when commodity prices moved higher, but then spiked when the S&P500 crashed in late 2008.     

Financial reforms and money demand: Evidence from 20 developing countries

The effects of financial reforms on money demand (M1) are analysed with estimates for two sets of sub-samples and two break dates for twenty developing Asian and African countries. In all cases, the magnitude of income elasticity does not change significantly when compared with sub-samples and whole sample periods. Using CUSUM and CUSUMSQ tests, we find that the demand for money functions in our selected countries are temporally stable and therefore the respective monetary authorities may target money supply as the conduct of monetary policy.     

The graph of Lindahl correspondence as the unique von Neumann-Morgenstern abstract stable set

In this paper, we consider a continuum economy with a finite number of types of agent, and several private and public goods. The main result of the paper is that the graph of the equal-treatment Lindahl equilibria mapping is the unique abstract stable set with respect to the dominance relation in economies with crowding effects introduced by Vasil'ev et al. in 1995. The external stability of this mapping implies that, for any equal-treatment allocation x in , that is not a Lindahl equilibrium, there exists a subeconomy of such that one of its equal-treatment Lindahl allocations blocks x. This result is a counterpart of the theorem of Mas-Colell for Aumann's atomless market with private goods.