Spreading the word or reducing the term spread? Assessing spillovers from euro area monetary policy

As a consequence of asset purchases by the European Central Bank (ECB), longer- term yields in the euro area decline, and spreads between euro area long-term yields narrow. To assess spillovers of these recent financial developments, we use a Bayesian variant of the global vector autoregressive (BGVAR) model that uses shrinkage priors coupled with stochastic volatility. We find positive and signif- icant spillovers to industrial production in Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe (CESEE) and other non-euro area EU member states. These effects are transmitted via the financial channel (mainly through interest rates and equity prices) and outweigh costs of appreciation pressure on local currencies vis-a-vis the euro (trade channel). That both shocks yield rather similar results adds narrowing longer-term yields in the euro area as a viable alternative to the pol- icymakers' toolkit. While these results represent general trends, we also find evidence for both cross-country heterogeneity of effects within the euro area and region-specific spillovers thereof.