Research
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What Can Earnings Calls Tell Us About the Output Gap and Inflation in Canada?
We construct new indicators of demand and supply for the Canadian economy by using natural language processing techniques to analyze earnings calls of publicly listed firms. Our results indicate that the new indicators could help central banks identify inflationary pressures in real time. -
Estimating the Slope of the Demand Function at Auctions for Government of Canada Bonds
We use bid data from Government of Canada bond auctions between 1999 and 2021 to gauge the yield sensitivity of these bonds to the issuance amount. Our new metric estimates the demand function of the bidders at each auction and offers insights into the relationship between supply and yield of government bonds. -
Why Consumers Disagree About Future Inflation
Since 2022, consumer inflation expectations have shifted, with a significant increase in those expecting high inflation in the coming year and a surge in those expecting deflation further in the future. Using data from the Canadian Survey of Consumer Expectations, this paper seeks to assess the factors that influence people to expect high inflation, moderate inflation or deflation. -
Markups and inflation during the COVID-19 pandemic
We find that prices and costs for consumer-oriented firms moved roughly one-for-one during the COVID-19 pandemic. This means firms fully passed rising costs through to the prices they charged. However, our results are suggestive, given data limitations and the uncertainty associated with estimating markups. -
What People Believe About Monetary Finance and What We Can(’t) Do About It: Evidence from a Large-Scale, Multi-Country Survey Experiment
We conduct a large-scale survey to shed light on what people believe about public finance. An experiment demonstrates that central bank communication can persistently shift views on monetary financing. It further suggests that views on monetary financing impact support for fiscal discipline. -
Monetary Policy Transmission, Bank Market Power, and Wholesale Funding Reliance
I study how banking market concentration and reliance on wholesale funding affect monetary policy transmission to mortgage rates. I find that this transmission is imperfect and dampens the response of consumption, output, and housing prices. -
Unpacking Moving: A Quantitative Spatial Equilibrium Model with Wealth
We propose a model to understand low observed migration rates by considering the interaction between location and wealth decisions. We look at different policies and find that temporary moving vouchers only slightly increase welfare, while lower housing regulations can decrease the welfare gap by lowering house prices nationwide. -
Privacy-Preserving Post-Quantum Credentials for Digital Payments
Digital payments and decentralized systems enable the creation of new financial products and services for users. One core challenge in digital payments is the need to protect users from fraud and abuse while retaining privacy in individual transactions. We propose a pseudonymous credential scheme for use in payment systems to tackle this problem. -
SME Failures Under Large Liquidity Shocks: An Application to the COVID-19 Crisis
We study the effects of financial frictions on firm exit when firms face large liquidity shocks. We develop a simple model of firm cost-minimization that introduces a financial friction that limits firms’ borrowing capacity to smooth temporary shocks to liquidity.