100 Jahre Federal Reserve System

The Federal Reserve System (Fed) was created in December 1913 when the Federal Reserve Act was signed. Since then, the Fed has become the most influential central bank in the world. This article gives an overview of the Fed’s history and its structure before evaluating the Fed’s monetary policy over the last 100 years. The main findings are that the last 100 years have shown that a central bank is useful for solving economic problems but that sometimes the central bank has created its own problems.     

Federal Reserve and private forecasts of growth in investment

This study examines the Federal Reserve and private forecasts of growth in both business and residential investment for 1983-2004 and reaches four main conclusions: First, in support of the asymmetric information hypothesis, the shorter (longer) horizon Federal Reserve forecasts of growth in business (residential) investment contain useful predictive information beyond that included in private forecasts. Second, the Federal Reserve forecasts are all biased. The same is true for the private forecasts of growth in residential (but not entirely for the forecasts of growth in business) investment. Third, the private forecasts overall do better than those of the Federal Reserve in outperforming the univariate forecasts. Fourth, the Federal Reserve and private forecasts of growth in business (residential) investment, while directionally accurate, imply symmetric (asymmetric) loss. We conclude this study by discussing the usefulness of these forecasts.     

密切相关--美联储加息节奏与人民币升值预期的思考

近期外汇市场伴随对人民币升：值预期的猜测,出现日元价格变化扩大趋势,进而使美元和欧元汇率也有波折。同时国内外金融市场对于人民币升值的预期再掀高潮,尽管我国央行以及决策官员明确表述了人民币汇率形成机制的进程与问题,但是市场炒作人民币的势头仍难以抑制。仔细分析这些现象的背景,似乎与美国官员近期对人民币问题的言论有关,     

Further Evidence on the Firm-Size Relation and Stock Market Responses to Changes in Federal Reserve Margin Levels

The virtually monotonic firm-size/price-reactions observed following changes in U.S. Federal Reserve market margin requirements over the post-1962 period provide dramatic new evidence in support of the hypothesis that changes in margin levels are associated with changes in security return behavior. Variance tests of the 1970 and 1971 margin decreases also produce evidence consistent with this hypothesis.     

Exporting to the Federal Republic of Germany

Among Industrialised countries, the Federal Republic is certainly one of the largest markets able to absorb vast quantities of products from the LDCs of South East Asia. However, to open up this sales outlet with its formidable future, it will be necessary to operate an all-embracing marketing strategy.     

Basic analytics of multilateral lending and surveillance

I analyse the role of multilateral financial institutions in a world of global capital markets assuming that they have an informational advantage over private lenders in the market for sovereign debt. I show that the adverse selection problem in this market may be solved through certification if the multilateral agency does not care too much about borrower country welfare. However, with lending the private information of the agency will be revealed whatever its weighting of borrower welfare vs. private lenders' profits. Multilateral lending on concessional terms also alleviates the moral hazard problem — that investment in creditworthy borrowers is reduced as private lenders seek to avoid ex post default by constraining credit.     

HSBC facilitates trade settlement using Chinese＇s Renminbi currency

A top Chinese banker has warned domestic banks to control the pace of lending flowing to infrastructure projects backed by local governments.     

Determinants of Corporate Donations to Nonprofits

The current study was undertaken to begin an initial investigation of determinants of corporate charitable giving. Factors analyzed include donor corporation demographics, forms of donations utilized, and corporate preferences with regard to the beneficiaries of their giving. Results indicate that age of the nonprofit and age of the corporation as well as relationships between owners/managers and workers with the nonprofit are positively related to donations. Strategic implications for these and other results are discussed.     

Lending technologies,lending specialization,and minority access to small-business loans

We investigate minority access to small-business loans using a probit model of loan application denial that recognizes two loan types (line-of-credit loans and non-line-of-credit loans) made by two lender types (commercial banks and nonbank financial institutions). We estimate our model on data from the 1998 Survey of Small Business Finances. We find evidence consistent with minority equal access to bank credit lines and nonbank non-line-of-credit loans in highly competitive loan markets; in less competitive markets we find evidence consistent with unequal access to these loans. We also find evidence consistent with unequal minority access to bank non-line-of-credit loans, regardless of loan market competitiveness. Our findings differ from previous research which treats small-business loans as a homogenous product and finds evidence consistent with unequal minority access to small-business loans generally. We argue that the existence of multiple small-business lending technologies and loan specialization by lenders account for our findings and demonstrate the need to treat small-business loans as a heterogeneous product when investigating equal access to small-business credit.     

Mitchel Y. Abolafia: Stewards of the Market: How the Federal Reserve Made Sense of the Financial Crisis

Business Economics -     

Determinants of FDI inflows to Arab economies

The paper studies location determinants of foreign direct investment (FDI) to 16 Arab economies over the period from 1984 to 2012, by employing Arellano–Bover/Blundell–Bond linear dynamic panel data estimation. We find that market size, trade openness, preferential trade agreements and financial development have significant positive impact on FDI inflows to Arab economies. FDI in Arab economies appears to be resource seeking since the total oil supply variable is positive and significant. The paper finds that better institutions and educated labour force may play a key role in attracting FDI inflows. We suggest that Arab economies should sequence their economic policy measures with the institutional ones, beginning with a focus on privatization and trade liberalization, and subsequently shift to improvement in economic growth.     

Designing Federal Budget Policy to Spur Economic Growth

Federal budget policy should focus on raising incomes for lower- and middle-income people, because they have benefited little from economic growth in the past few decades. That goal would be advanced by maintaining federal investment as a share of total output, reforming the tax code, encouraging innovation, reducing federal debt slowly, and reducing uncertainty about future policy. However, the likely effects of budget policy on income growth should not be exaggerated.     

Federal trade commission activities related to consumer information

This paper discusses activities, policies, and problems of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) related to consumer information. Its major elements are: first, a brief introduction setting the framework and boundaries of the consumer information area within FTC action and responsibility; second, a discussion of the more traditional activities of the FTC related to consumer information; third, consideration of the FTC's more recent information-related activities and concerns; fourth, an attempt to reflect some of the issues and problems that attach to this information area; and finally, some very brief speculation about the future of information programs at the FTC.

---

Zusammenfassung Der Beitrag behandelt die Tätigkeit, die Zielvorstellungen und die Probleme der amerikanischen Federal Trade Commission (FTC), soweit sie auf Verbraucherinformation gerichtet sind. Eine kurze Einführung skizziert den Rahmen und die Grenzen, innerhalb derer die FTC auf dem Gebiet der Verbraucherinformation tätig werden kann und verantwortlich ist. Zwei größere Abschnitte behandeln die herkömmlichen und die neu hinzugekommenen Aktivitäten der FTC bei der Behandlung irreführender und der Förderung zutreffender Information. Es erweist sich, daß sich die Verbraucherpolitik immer weniger damit begnügen kann, irreführende Werbung nachträglich zu untersagen. In einem weiteren Hauptabschnitt werden die Wirkungen sowie die theoretischen Grundlagen der Informationspolitik der FTC behandelt und die Rolle der Werbung aus der Sicht der FTC analysiert. Der Beitrag schließt mit einigen Überlegungen über die künftige Entwicklung der Informationspolitik der FTC.

---

---

John A. Miller is Visiting Associate Professor of Marketing, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, USA. As from May 1977, his new affiliation and address will be: School of Business, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, Colorado 80907, USA. The article is a modification of a working paper presented at the Second Workshop on Consumer Action Research, Berlin, April 1975, while the author was a Consultant on Marketing and Consumer Behavior to the Federal Trade Commission. The observations reflected in the discussion are those of the author. Although he is most grateful for the expert help and comments of Mrs. Joan Bernstein, formerly Deputy Director, Bureau of Consumer Protection, Mr. G. C. Ianelly, formerly Deputy Assistant Director for National Advertising, Dr. Dennis Murphy, formerly Assistant Director for Special Statutes, the views expressed here are his own and in no way should be interpreted as those of the Commission or its staff.     

Determinants of Consumer Responses to Direct Marketing Media

Abstract

This study examined consumer propensity to respond to direct marketing offers made via catalogs, direct mail, and direct response TV. A comparison of the relative importance of marketer's reputation, advertising exposure frequency, and the product offer revealed that the latter was the most important determinant of consumer response frequency. Marketer's reputation was found to be more important for direct response TV and less important for catalog advertising: neither did high frequency of media exposure appear to impact on responses to direct mail and direct response television. The findings suggest that the maximization of reach rather than frequency could possibly be the primary media communication goal for selling products through direct mail and direct response television.     

Group lending and the role of the group leader

This paper investigates strategic monitoring behavior within group lending. We show that monitoring efforts of group members differ in equilibrium due to the asymmetry between members in terms of future profits. In particular, we show that the entrepreneur with the highest future profits also puts in the highest monitoring effort. Moreover, monitoring efforts differ between group members due to free-riding: one member reduces her level of monitoring if the other increases her monitoring effort. This effect is also at play when we introduce a group leader into the model. The individual who becomes the group leader supplies more monitoring effort than in the benchmark case. We empirically test the model using data from a survey of microfinance in Eritrea and show that the group leader attaches more weight to future periods than nonleaders in the group, which may explain why a large part of total monitoring is done by the leader.     

A Temporary Federal Discount Program to Stimulate Consumer Spending

In this paper, we evaluate a new proposal to stimulate recovery from the current recession: a temporary federal price discount on consumer goods. An attractive feature of the temporary federal discount program is that it gives consumers a price incentive to purchase more rather than simply giving consumers more disposable income, which they might choose to either spend or to save. According to our simulations with the Fair macro-econometric model, a temporary 20 percent federal discount on all consumer goods in a severe recession would significantly reduce the unemployment rate while causing only a small increase in federal debt as a percentage of GDP.