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Tests of the expectations hypothesis: resolving the anomalies when the short-term rate is the federal funds rate

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Daniel L. Thornton

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Abstract

The expectations hypothesis (EH) of the term structure plays an important role in the analysis of monetary policy, where shorter-term rates are assumed to be determined by the market’s expectation for the overnight federal funds rate. With two exceptions, tests using the effective federal funds rate as the short-term rate easily reject the EH. These exceptions are when the EH is tested over the nonborrowed reserve targeting period and when the test is performed only using data for settlement Wednesdays—the last day of bank’s reserve maintenance period. This paper argues that these exceptions are anomalous: In the former case, the failure to reject the EH occurs when economic analysis suggests that the market should be less able to forecast the federal funds rate. In the latter case, it occurs when there are sharp spikes in the funds rate that cannot improve materially the market’s ability to forecast the funds rate. Additional analysis shows that these anomalous results are a consequence of the procedure used to test the EH.

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Paper provided by Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis in its series Working Papers with number 2000-003.

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Date of creation: 2004
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Publication status: Published in Journal of Banking and Finance, October 2005, 29(10), pp. 2541-56
Handle: RePEc:fip:fedlwp:2000-003

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Keywords: Rational expectations (Economic theory) Federal funds rate

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References listed on IDEAS
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  2. Newey, Whitney K & West, Kenneth D, 1987. "A Simple, Positive Semi-definite, Heteroskedasticity and Autocorrelation Consistent Covariance Matrix," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 55(3), pages 703-08, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  3. Feinman, Joshua N, 1993. "Estimating the Open Market Desk's Daily Reaction Function," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 25(2), pages 231-47, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. Rudebusch, Glenn D., 1995. "Federal Reserve interest rate targeting, rational expectations, and the term structure," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(2), pages 245-274, April. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  7. William Poole & Robert Rasche, 2000. "Perfecting the Market's Knowledge of Monetary Policy," Journal of Financial Services Research, Springer, vol. 18(2), pages 255-298, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  8. Fama, Eugene F., 1984. "The information in the term structure," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 13(4), pages 509-528, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  9. Balduzzi, Pierluigi & Bertola, Giuseppe & Foresi, Silverio, 1997. "A model of target changes and the term structure of interest rates," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(2), pages 223-249, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  10. McCallum, Bennett T., 1994. "A reconsideration of the uncovered interest parity relationship," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 105-132, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  11. Simon, David P, 1990. " Expectations and the Treasury Bill-Federal Funds Rate Spread over Recent Monetary Policy Regimes," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 45(2), pages 467-77, June.
  12. Poole, William, 1991. "Interest rates and the conduct of monetary policy : A comment," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 31-39, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  13. Michael Woodford, 2001. "Monetary policy in the information economy," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, pages 297-370. [Downloadable!]
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  14. 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)
  15. Hsu, Chiente & Kugler, Peter, 1997. "The Revival of the Expectations Hypothesis of the US Term Structure of Interest Rates," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 115-120, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  16. Campbell, John Y & Shiller, Robert J, 1991. "Yield Spreads and Interest Rate Movements: A Bird's Eye View," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 58(3), pages 495-514, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  17. Robert J. Shiller & John Y. Campbell & Kermit L. Schoenholtz, 1983. "Forward Rates and Future Policy: Interpreting the Term Structure of Interest Rates," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 667, Cowles Foundation, Yale University. [Downloadable!]
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  18. Goodfriend, Marvin, 1991. "Interest rates and the conduct of monetary policy," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 7-30, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  19. John B. Taylor, 2001. "Expectations, open market operations, and changes in the federal funds rate," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, issue Jul, pages 33-58. [Downloadable!]
  20. Hardouvelis, Gikas A, 1988. " The Predictive Power of the Term Structure during Recent Monetary Regimes," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 43(2), pages 339-56, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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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. Modena, Matteo, 2008. "The term structure and the expectations hypothesis: a threshold model," MPRA Paper 9611, University Library of Munich, Germany. [Downloadable!]
  2. Daniel L. Thornton, 2008. "Monetary policy: why money matters and interest rates don't," Working Papers 2008-011, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. [Downloadable!]
  3. Daniel L. Thornton, 2003. "Monetary policy transparency: transparent about what?," Working Papers 2002-028, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. [Downloadable!]
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  4. Metodij Hadzi-Vaskov & Clemens Kool, 2006. "The Importance of Interest Rate Volatility in Empirical Tests of Uncovered Interest Parity," Working Papers 06-16, Utrecht School of Economics. [Downloadable!]
  5. Della Corte, Pasquale & Sarno, Lucio & Thornton, Daniel L, 2007. "The Expectation Hypothesis of the Term Structure of Very Short-Term Rates: Statistical Tests and Economic Value," CEPR Discussion Papers 6445, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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