IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/ecinqu/v43y2005i3p558-569.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

On the Information Content of Asymmetric FOMC Policy Statements: Evidence From a Taylor-Rule Perspective

Author

Listed:
  • Michael R. Pakko

Abstract

For over two decades, the FOMC has included in its policy decisions a statement of bias toward subsequent tightening or easing of policy. This article examines the predictive content of these statements in a Taylor-rule setting, finding that they convey useful information for forecasting changes in the federal funds rate target, even after controlling for policy responses to inflation and the output gap. Moreover, the evidence suggests that this asymmetry can be represented in terms of shifts to the parameters of the Taylor-rule equation, indicating a greater or lesser degree of responsiveness to information about inflation and output. (JEL E52, E58) Copyright 2005, Oxford University Press.

Suggested Citation

  • Michael R. Pakko, 2005. "On the Information Content of Asymmetric FOMC Policy Statements: Evidence From a Taylor-Rule Perspective," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 43(3), pages 558-569, July.
  • Handle: RePEc:oup:ecinqu:v:43:y:2005:i:3:p:558-569
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/ei/cbi038
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Athanasios Orphanides, 2001. "Monetary Policy Rules Based on Real-Time Data," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(4), pages 964-985, September.
    2. Richard Clarida & Jordi Galí & Mark Gertler, 2000. "Monetary Policy Rules and Macroeconomic Stability: Evidence and Some Theory," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 115(1), pages 147-180.
    3. 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.
    4. Mehra, Yash P., 2001. "The bond rate and estimated monetary policy rules," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 53(4), pages 345-358.
    5. Robert H. Rasche & Daniel L. Thornton, 2002. "The FOMC's balance-of-risks statement and market expectations of policy actions," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, vol. 84(Sep), pages 37-50.
    6. Taylor, John B., 1993. "Discretion versus policy rules in practice," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 195-214, December.
    7. Taylor, John B., 1999. "The robustness and efficiency of monetary policy rules as guidelines for interest rate setting by the European central bank," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(3), pages 655-679, June.
    8. Sharon Kozicki, 1999. "How useful are Taylor rules for monetary policy?," Economic Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, vol. 84(Q II), pages 5-33.
    9. John B. Taylor, 1999. "Monetary Policy Rules," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number tayl99-1, March.
    10. Daniel L. Thornton & David C. Wheelock, 2000. "A history of the asymmetric policy directive," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, vol. 82(Sep), pages 1-16.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Mario Gonzalez and Raul Cruz Tadle & Raul Cruz Tadle, 2022. "Monetary policy press releases: an international comparison," BIS Working Papers 1023, Bank for International Settlements.
    2. Alan S. Blinder & Michael Ehrmann & Marcel Fratzscher & Jakob De Haan & David-Jan Jansen, 2008. "Central Bank Communication and Monetary Policy: A Survey of Theory and Evidence," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 46(4), pages 910-945, December.
    3. repec:fce:doctra:13-03 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Andrei Sirchenko, 2019. "A regime-switching model for the federal funds rate target," UvA-Econometrics Working Papers 19-01, Universiteit van Amsterdam, Dept. of Econometrics.
    5. Alan S. Blinder, 2008. "Talking about Monetary Policy: The Virtues (and Vices?) of Central Bank Communication," Working Papers 1048, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Center for Economic Policy Studies..
    6. Fischer, Andreas M. & Ranaldo, Angelo, 2011. "Does FOMC news increase global FX trading?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 35(11), pages 2965-2973, November.
    7. Paul Hubert, 2015. "The Influence and Policy Signalling Role of FOMC Forecasts," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 77(5), pages 655-680, October.
    8. Pisun Xu & Jian Yang, 2011. "U.S. Monetary Policy Surprises and International Securitized Real Estate Markets," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 43(4), pages 459-490, November.
    9. Qin, Ting & Enders, Walter, 2008. "In-sample and out-of-sample properties of linear and nonlinear Taylor rules," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 428-443, March.
    10. Hubert, Paul & Labondance, Fabien, 2021. "The signaling effects of central bank tone," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 133(C).
    11. Paul Hubert & Fabien Labondance, 2019. "Central bank tone and the dispersion of views within monetary policy committees," Sciences Po publications 2019 – 08, Sciences Po.
    12. David-Jan Jansen & Jakob de Haan, 2005. "Is a Word to the Wise Indeed Enough? ECB Statements and the Predictibility of Interest Rate Decisions," DNB Working Papers 075, Netherlands Central Bank, Research Department.
    13. Hayo, Bernd & Neuenkirch, Matthias, 2010. "Do Federal Reserve communications help predict federal funds target rate decisions?," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 32(4), pages 1014-1024, December.
    14. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/3mgbd73vkp9f9oje7utooe7vpg is not listed on IDEAS
    15. Seibert, Armin & Sirchenko, Andrei & Müller, Gernot, 2021. "A model for policy interest rates," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).
    16. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/7v8fvu0bf08jcoi4epn8cutjm8 is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Alan S. Blinder, 2008. "Talking about Monetary Policy: The Virtues (and Vices?) of Central Bank Communication," Working Papers 1048, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Center for Economic Policy Studies..
    18. repec:pri:cepsud:164blinder is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Bluhm, Marcel, 2011. "Investigating the monetary policy of central banks with assessment indicators," CFS Working Paper Series 2011/20, Center for Financial Studies (CFS).
    20. Bernd Hayo & Matthias Neuenkirch, 2011. "Canadian Interest Rate Setting: The Information Content of Canadian and U.S. Central Bank Communication," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 78(1), pages 131-148, July.
    21. repec:pri:cepsud:161blinder is not listed on IDEAS
    22. Paul Hubert, 2015. "The Influence and Policy Signalling Role of FOMC Forecasts," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 77(5), pages 655-680, October.
    23. Bluhm, Marcel, 2015. "Investigating the monetary policy of central banks with assessment indicators," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 181-196.
    24. Alan S. Blinder & Michael Ehrmann & Marcel Fratzscher & Jakob De Haan & David-Jan Jansen, 2008. "Central Bank Communication and Monetary Policy: A Survey of Theory and Evidence," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 46(4), pages 910-945, December.

    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. Stephan Sauer & Jan-Egbert Sturm, 2003. "Using Taylor Rules to Understand ECB Monetary Policy," CESifo Working Paper Series 1110, CESifo.
    2. Hayat, Aziz & Mishra, Sagarika, 2010. "Federal reserve monetary policy and the non-linearity of the Taylor rule," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 27(5), pages 1292-1301, September.
    3. Pär Österholm, 2005. "The Taylor Rule: A Spurious Regression?," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(3), pages 217-247, July.
    4. Mehra, Yash P., 2002. "Level and growth policy rules and actual Fed policy since 1979," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 54(6), pages 575-594.
    5. Denise R. Osborn & Dong Heon Kim & Marianne Sensier, 2005. "Nonlinearity in the Fed's monetary policy rule," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(5), pages 621-639.
    6. Clémentine Florens & Eric Jondeau & Hervé Le Bihan, 2001. "Assessing GMM Estimates of the Federal Reserve Reaction Function," Econometrics 0111003, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Michael Woodford, 1999. "Optimal Monetary Policy Inertia," Manchester School, University of Manchester, vol. 67(s1), pages 1-35.
    8. Annicchiarico, Barbara & Giammarioli, Nicola & Piergallini, Alessandro, 2012. "Budgetary policies in a DSGE model with finite horizons," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2), pages 111-130.
    9. Glenn D. Rudebusch, 2006. "Monetary Policy Inertia: Fact or Fiction?," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 2(4), December.
    10. Nikolsko-Rzhevskyy, Alex & Papell, David H. & Prodan, Ruxandra, 2021. "Policy Rules and Economic Performance," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    11. Orphanides, Athanasios, 2003. "The quest for prosperity without inflation," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(3), pages 633-663, April.
    12. Kuttner, Kenneth N. & Posen, Adam S., 2004. "The difficulty of discerning what's too tight: Taylor rules and Japanese monetary policy," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 15(1), pages 53-74, March.
    13. Kevin Lee & James Morley & Kalvinder Shields, 2015. "The Meta Taylor Rule," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 47(1), pages 73-98, February.
    14. Cour-Thimann, Philippine & Jung, Alexander, 2021. "Interest-rate setting and communication at the ECB in its first twenty years," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    15. Huang, Kevin X.D. & Meng, Qinglai & Xue, Jianpo, 2009. "Is forward-looking inflation targeting destabilizing? The role of policy's response to current output under endogenous investment," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 33(2), pages 409-430, February.
    16. David Shepherd & Rebeca I. Muñoz Torres & George Saridakis, 2019. "Monetary policy rules with PID control features: evidence from the UK, USA and EU," International Review of Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 33(6), pages 737-755, November.
    17. Gerberding, Christina & Seitz, Franz & Worms, Andreas, 2007. "Money-based interest rate rules: lessons from German data," Discussion Paper Series 1: Economic Studies 2007,06, Deutsche Bundesbank.
    18. Ahmad, Saad, 2016. "A multiple threshold analysis of the Fed's balancing act during the Great Moderation," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 343-358.
    19. Luís, Pacheco, 2004. "Asset Prices and Monetary Policy in the Euro Area: a tentative model," MPRA Paper 6579, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Robert Tchaidze & Alina Carare, 2004. "The Use and Abuse of Taylor Rules: How precisely can we estimate them?," Econometric Society 2004 Latin American Meetings 132, Econometric Society.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy
    • E58 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Central Banks and Their Policies

    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:oup:ecinqu:v:43:y:2005:i:3:p:558-569. 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: Oxford University Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/weaaaea.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.