IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/red/sed011/982.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Let's Twist Again: A High-Frequency Event-Study Analysis of Operation Twist and Its Implications for QE2

Author

Listed:
  • Eric T. Swanson

    (Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco)

Abstract

This paper undertakes a modern event-study analysis of Operation Twist and compares its effects to those that should be expected for the recent quantitative policy announced by the Federal Reserve, dubbed ``QE2''. We first show that Operation Twist and QE2 are similar in magnitude. We identify six significant, discrete announcements in the course of Operation Twist that potentially could have had a major effect on financial markets, and show that four did have statistically significant effects. The cumulative effect of these six announcements on longer-term Treasury yields is highly statistically significant but moderate, amounting to about 15 basis points. This estimate is consistent both with Modigliani and Sutch's (1966) time series analysis and with the lower end of empirical estimates of Treasury supply effects in the literature.

Suggested Citation

  • Eric T. Swanson, 2011. "Let's Twist Again: A High-Frequency Event-Study Analysis of Operation Twist and Its Implications for QE2," 2011 Meeting Papers 982, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    • Handle: RePEc:red:sed011:982
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://red-files-public.s3.amazonaws.com/meetpapers/2011/paper_982.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dimitri Vayanos & Jean‐Luc Vila, 2021. "A Preferred‐Habitat Model of the Term Structure of Interest Rates," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 89(1), pages 77-112, January.
    2. Faust, Jon & Swanson, Eric T. & Wright, Jonathan H., 2004. "Identifying VARS based on high frequency futures data," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(6), pages 1107-1131, September.
    3. Christiano, Lawrence J. & Eichenbaum, Martin & Evans, Charles L., 1999. "Monetary policy shocks: What have we learned and to what end?," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & M. Woodford (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 2, pages 65-148, Elsevier.
    4. Robin Greenwood & Dimitri Vayanos, 2014. "Bond Supply and Excess Bond Returns," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 27(3), pages 663-713.
    5. Jones, Charles M. & Lamont, Owen & Lumsdaine, Robin L., 1998. "Macroeconomic news and bond market volatility," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(3), pages 315-337, March.
    6. Arvind Krishnamurthy & Annette Vissing-Jorgensen, 2007. "The Demand for Treasury Debt," NBER Working Papers 12881, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Franco Modigliani & Richard Sutch, 1967. "Debt Management and the Term Structure of Interest Rates: An Empirical Analysis of Recent Experience," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 75, pages 569-569.
    8. Refet S. Gürkaynak & Jonathan H. Wright, 2012. "Macroeconomics and the Term Structure," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 50(2), pages 331-367, June.
    9. James D. Hamilton & Jing Cynthia Wu, 2012. "The Effectiveness of Alternative Monetary Policy Tools in a Zero Lower Bound Environment," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 44(s1), pages 3-46, February.
    10. Francis E. Warnock & Veronica C. Warnock, 2005. "International Capital Flows and U.S. Interest Rates," The Institute for International Integration Studies Discussion Paper Series iiisdp103, IIIS.
    11. Joseph E. Gagnon & Matthew Raskin & Julie Remache & Brian P. Sack, 2011. "Large-scale asset purchases by the Federal Reserve: did they work?," Economic Policy Review, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, vol. 17(May), pages 41-59.
    12. Refet S Gürkaynak & Brian Sack & Eric Swanson, 2005. "Do Actions Speak Louder Than Words? The Response of Asset Prices to Monetary Policy Actions and Statements," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 1(1), May.
    13. Michael J. Fleming & Eli M. Remolona, 1999. "Price Formation and Liquidity in the U.S. Treasury Market: The Response to Public Information," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 54(5), pages 1901-1915, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. D’Amico, Stefania & King, Thomas B., 2013. "Flow and stock effects of large-scale treasury purchases: Evidence on the importance of local supply," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(2), pages 425-448.
    2. W. Arrata & B. Nguyen, 2017. "Price impact of bond supply shocks: Evidence from the Eurosystem's asset purchase program," Working papers 623, Banque de France.
    3. Jonathan H. Wright, 2012. "What does Monetary Policy do to Long‐term Interest Rates at the Zero Lower Bound?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 122(564), pages 447-466, November.
    4. Smales, L.A., 2021. "Macroeconomic news and treasury futures return volatility: Do treasury auctions matter?," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 48(C).
    5. Michael T. Kiley, 2014. "The Aggregate Demand Effects of Short- and Long-Term Interest Rates," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 10(4), pages 69-104, December.
    6. Joseph E. Gagnon & Matthew Raskin & Julie Remache & Brian P. Sack, 2011. "Large-scale asset purchases by the Federal Reserve: did they work?," Economic Policy Review, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, vol. 17(May), pages 41-59.
    7. Christoph Trebesch & Jeromin Zettelmeyer, 2018. "ECB Interventions in Distressed Sovereign Debt Markets: The Case of Greek Bonds," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 66(2), pages 287-332, June.
    8. Stefania D'Amico & Thomas B. King, 2012. "Flow and stock effects of large-scale asset purchases: evidence on the importance of local supply," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2012-44, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    9. Martina Cecioni & Giuseppe Ferrero & Alessandro Secchi, 2018. "Unconventional Monetary Policy in Theory and in Practice," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Douglas D Evanoff & George G Kaufman & A G Malliaris (ed.), Innovative Federal Reserve Policies During the Great Financial Crisis, chapter 1, pages 1-36, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    10. Michael E. Cahill & Stefania D'Amico & Canlin Li & John S. Sears, 2013. "Duration risk versus local supply channel in Treasury yields: evidence from the Federal Reserve's asset purchase announcements," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2013-35, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    11. Hanson, Samuel G. & Stein, Jeremy C., 2015. "Monetary policy and long-term real rates," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(3), pages 429-448.
    12. Refet S. Gürkaynak & Jonathan H. Wright, 2012. "Macroeconomics and the Term Structure," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 50(2), pages 331-367, June.
    13. Massimo Guidolin & Manuela Pedio, 2019. "Forecasting and Trading Monetary Policy Effects on the Riskless Yield Curve with Regime Switching Nelson†Siegel Models," Working Papers 639, IGIER (Innocenzo Gasparini Institute for Economic Research), Bocconi University.
    14. Carlo Altavilla & Domenico Giannone, 2017. "The Effectiveness of Non‐Standard Monetary Policy Measures: Evidence from Survey Data," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 32(5), pages 952-964, August.
    15. Neely, Christopher J., 2015. "Unconventional monetary policy had large international effects," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 101-111.
    16. Jagjit S Chadha & Philip Turner & Fabrizio Zampolli, 2013. "The interest rate effects of government debt maturity," BIS Working Papers 415, Bank for International Settlements.
    17. Eric T. Swanson & John C. Williams, 2014. "Measuring the Effect of the Zero Lower Bound on Medium- and Longer-Term Interest Rates," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(10), pages 3154-3185, October.
    18. Chen, Zhengyang, 2019. "The Long-term Rate and Interest Rate Volatility in Monetary Policy Transmission," EconStor Preprints 204579, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    19. Jens H. E. Christensen & Signe Krogstrup, 2022. "A Portfolio Model of Quantitative Easing," Quarterly Journal of Finance (QJF), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 12(04), pages 1-39, December.
    20. Sophocles N. Brissimis & Evangelia A. Georgiou, 2022. "The effects of Federal Reserve's quantitative easing and balance sheet normalization policies on long-term interest rates," Working Papers 299, Bank of Greece.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:red:sed011:982. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Christian Zimmermann (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/sedddea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.