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Term premiums and inflation uncertainty: empirical evidence from an international panel dataset

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Jonathan H. Wright

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Abstract

This paper provides cross-country empirical evidence on term premia, inflation uncertainty, and their relationship. It has three components. First, I construct a panel of zero-coupon nominal government bond yields spanning ten countries and eighteen years. From these, I construct forward rates and decompose these into expected future short-term interest rates and term premiums, using both statistical methods (an affine term structure model) and using surveys. Second, I construct alternative measures of time-varying inflation uncertainty for these countries, using actual inflation data and survey expectations. I discuss some possible determinants of inflation uncertainty. Finally, I use panel data methods to investigate the relationship between term premium estimates and inflation uncertainty measures, and find a strong positive relationship. The economic determinants of term premia remain mysterious; but this evidence points to uncertainty about intermediate- to long-run inflation rates being a substantial part of the explanation for why yield curves slope up.

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Paper provided by Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.) in its series Finance and Economics Discussion Series with number 2008-25.

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Date of creation: 2008
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Handle: RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2008-25

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Keywords: Inflation (Finance) ; Bonds - Prices;

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This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports: References listed on IDEAS
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  1. John Y. Campbell & Adi Sunderam & Luis M. Viceira, 2009. "Inflation Bets or Deflation Hedges? The Changing Risks of Nominal Bonds," NBER Working Papers 14701, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Friedman, Milton, 1977. "Nobel Lecture: Inflation and Unemployment," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 85(3), pages 451-72, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Andrew Ang & Geert Bekaert & Min Wei, 2006. "Do macro variables, asset markets, or surveys forecast inflation better?," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2006-15, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.). [Downloadable!]
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  4. James H. Stock & Mark W. Watson, 2007. "Why Has U.S. Inflation Become Harder to Forecast?," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 39(s1), pages 3-33, 02. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Ang, Andrew & Piazzesi, Monika, 2003. "A no-arbitrage vector autoregression of term structure dynamics with macroeconomic and latent variables," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(4), pages 745-787, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. Monika Piazzesi & Martin Schneider, 2008. "Bond positions, expectations, and the yield curve," Working Paper 2008-02, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. [Downloadable!]
  7. Sharon Kozicki & P.A. Tinsley, 1997. "Shifting endpoints in the term structure of interest rates," Research Working Paper 97-08, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. [Downloadable!]
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  8. Froot, Kenneth A, 1989. " New Hope for the Expectations Hypothesis of the Term Structure of Interest Rates," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 44(2), pages 283-305, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  9. Beechey, Meredith J & Johannsen, Benjamin K & Levin, Andrew, 2007. "Are Long-Run Inflation Expectations Anchored More Firmly in the Euro Area than in the United States?," CEPR Discussion Papers 6536, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  10. Linda S. Goldberg & Michael W. Klein, 2005. "Establishing Credibility: Evolving Perceptions of the European Central Bank," The Institute for International Integration Studies Discussion Paper Series iiisdp105, IIIS. [Downloadable!]
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  11. Cukierman, Alex & Wachtel, Paul, 1979. "Differential Inflationary Expectations and the Variability of the Rate of Inflation: Theory and Evidence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 69(4), pages 595-609, September. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  12. Andrew T. Levin & Jeremy M. Piger, 2003. "Is inflation persistence intrinsic in industrial economies?," Working Papers 2002-023, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. [Downloadable!]
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  13. Monika Piazzesi & Martin Schneider, 2006. "Equilibrium Yield Curves," NBER Working Papers 12609, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  14. Philippe Bacchetta & Elmar Mertens & Eric van Wincoop, 2006. "Predictability in Financial Markets: What Do Survey Expectations Tell Us?," Working Papers 06.04, Swiss National Bank, Study Center Gerzensee. [Downloadable!]
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  15. Dai, Qiang & Singleton, Kenneth J., 2002. "Expectation puzzles, time-varying risk premia, and affine models of the term structure," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(3), pages 415-441, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  16. Wachter, Jessica A., 2006. "A consumption-based model of the term structure of interest rates," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(2), pages 365-399, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  17. Wachter, Jessica A., 2003. "Risk aversion and allocation to long-term bonds," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 112(2), pages 325-333, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  18. Mardi Dungey & Vance L Martin & Adrian R Pagan, 2000. "A multivariate latent factor decomposition of international bond yield spreads," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 15(6), pages 697-715. [Downloadable!]
  19. Rich, R W & Raymond, J E & Butler, J S, 1992. "The Relationship between Forecast Dispersion and Forecast Uncertainty: Evidence from a Survey Data-ARCH Model," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 7(2), pages 131-48, April-Jun. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  20. Robert Rich & Joseph Tracy, 2006. "The relationship between expected inflation, disagreement, and uncertainty: evidence from matched point and density forecasts," Staff Reports 253, Federal Reserve Bank of New York. [Downloadable!]
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Michael T. Kiley, 2008. "Inflation expectations, uncertainty, the Phillips curve, and monetary policy - comments," Conference Series ; [Proceedings], Federal Reserve Bank of Boston. [Downloadable!]
  2. Jonas Dovern & Ulrich Fritsche & Jiri Slacalek, 2009. "Disagreement among Forecasters in G7 Countries," Macroeconomics and Finance Series 200906, Hamburg University, Department Wirtschaft und Politik. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
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