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369
result(s)
The Exchange Rate and Canadian Inflation Targeting
Staff Working Paper 2005-34
Christopher Ragan
The author provides a non-technical explanation of the role played by the exchange rate in Canada's inflation-targeting monetary policy.
Content Type(s):
Staff research,
Staff working papers
Topic(s):
Exchange rates,
Inflation targets,
Monetary policy implementation
JEL Code(s):
E,
E5,
E50,
E52,
F,
F4,
F41
October 5, 2005
The Exchange Rate and Canadian Inflation Targeting
An essential element of the Bank of Canada's inflation-targeting framework is a floating exchange rate that is free to adjust in response to shocks that affect the Canadian and world economies. This floating rate plays an important role in the transmission mechanism for monetary policy. A practical question is how the Bank of Canada incorporates currency movements into the monetary policy decision-making process. Only after determining the cause and persistence of exchange rate change, and its likely net effect on aggregate demand, can the Bank decide on the appropriate policy response to keep inflation low, stable, and predictable. Ragan reviews the need to target inflation and the transmission mechanism for monetary policy, including the role of the exchange rate, before describing two types of exchange rate movements and their implications for monetary policy.
Content Type(s):
Publications,
Bank of Canada Review articles
Topic(s):
Exchange rates,
Inflation targets,
Monetary policy implementation
June 22, 2005
Estimating the Impact of Monetary Policy Surprises on Fixed-Income Markets
In the interest of better understanding the impact of the Bank of Canada's policy actions on bond and bill yields, Andreou assesses the impact of policy-rate announcements on short and long bonds over the period 1996 to 2004. To aid the analysis, policy actions are decomposed into expected and surprise components. He also examines whether the introduction of fixed announcement dates (FADs) has affected these results, including markets' perceptions. The main finding is that unexpected policy actions by the Bank have a significant effect on market rates at the shorter end of the yield curve, with the effect dissipating as the maturity increases. A second finding, that the impact on longer-term interest rates of a surprise action by the Bank has diminished since the introduction of the FADs, suggests that the Bank's long-term policy goals are well understood and credible.
Content Type(s):
Publications,
Bank of Canada Review articles
Topic(s):
Credibility,
Financial markets,
Monetary policy and uncertainty
Endogenous Central Bank Credibility in a Small Forward-Looking Model of the U.S. Economy
Staff Working Paper 2005-16
René Lalonde
The linkages between inflation and the economy's cyclical position are thought to be strongly affected by the credibility of monetary authorities.
Content Type(s):
Staff research,
Staff working papers
Topic(s):
Econometric and statistical methods,
Inflation and prices,
Monetary policy transmission
JEL Code(s):
C,
C3,
C32,
E,
E5,
E52
April 22, 2005
Borders, Common Currencies, Trade, and Welfare: What Can We Learn from the Evidence?
Recent evidence indicates that the intensity of economic exchange within and across borders is significantly different: linkages are much tighter within, than among, nation-states. These findings, however, do not necessarily imply that borders and separate national currencies represent significant barriers to trade that should be removed, since the evidence is also consistent with the alternative hypothesis, that domestic exchange is more efficient because domestic producers are better able to satisfy the requirements of local consumers, owing to common tastes and institutions and the existence of local information and social networks. Focusing primarily on trade linkages within and between Canada and the United States, the authors review the evidence on the extent to which national borders lessen the intensity of international economic linkages, primarily trade in goods and services, and the effects on domestic welfare. They also examine the evidence on the impact of common currencies on trade and welfare. They determine that, since the empirical models employed to date in this research cannot distinguish between alternative explanations of the evidence, it is not yet possible to draw firm conclusions for policy-making.
Content Type(s):
Publications,
Bank of Canada Review articles
Topic(s):
Exchange rate regimes,
International topics,
Monetary policy framework
Monetary Policy under Model and Data-Parameter Uncertainty
Staff Working Paper 2005-6
Gino Cateau
Policy-makers in the United States over the past 15 to 20 years seem to have been cautious in setting policy: empirical estimates of monetary policy rules such as Taylor's (1993) rule are much less aggressive than those derived from optimizing models.
Content Type(s):
Staff research,
Staff working papers
Topic(s):
Monetary policy and uncertainty
JEL Code(s):
D,
D8,
D81,
E,
E5,
E58
December 23, 2004
A Survey of the Price-Setting Behaviour of Canadian Companies
To better understand price-setting behaviour in the Canadian economy, the Bank of Canada's regional offices surveyed a representative sample of 170 firms between July 2002 and March 2003. The authors discuss the reasons behind the survey, the methodology used to develop the questionnaire and conduct the interviews, and summarize the results. The study also assessed several explanations for holding prices steady despite market pressures for a change. The survey findings indicate that prices in Canada are relatively flexible and have become more flexible over the past decade. Price stickiness was generally found to originate in firms' fears of antagonizing customers or disturbing the goodwill or reputation developed with them. A detailed discussion of the results includes a consideration of their implications for monetary policy.
Content Type(s):
Publications,
Bank of Canada Review articles
Topic(s):
Inflation and prices,
Monetary policy transmission
November 24, 2004
Asset Prices and Monetary Policy: A Canadian Perspective on the Issues
The issue addressed in this article is the extent to which monetary policy in Canada should respond to asset-price bubbles. The article concludes that maintaining low and stable consumer price inflation is the best contribution that monetary policy can make to promoting economic and financial stability, even when the economy experiences asset-price bubbles. In extreme circumstances—when an asset-price bubble is well identified and likely to have significant costs to the economy when it bursts—monetary policy might better maintain low and stable consumer price inflation by leaning against a particular bubble even though it may mean that inflation deviates temporarily from its target. Such a strategy might reduce the risk that a crash in asset prices could lead to a recession and to inflation markedly below target in the longer run. The circumstances where this strategy is possible will be rare because economists are far from being able to determine consistently and reliably when leaning against a particular bubble is likely to do more harm than good. Housing-price bubbles should be a greater concern for Canadian monetary policy than equity-price bubbles, since rising housing prices are more likely to reflect excessively easy domestic credit conditions than are equity prices, which are largely determined in global markets.
Content Type(s):
Publications,
Bank of Canada Review articles
Topic(s):
Inflation targets,
Monetary and financial indicators,
Monetary policy framework
The Transmission of World Shocks to Emerging-Market Countries: An Empirical Analysis
Staff Working Paper 2004-44
Brigitte Desroches
The first step in designing effective policies to stabilize an economy is to understand business cycles. No country is isolated from the world economy and external shocks are becoming increasingly important.
Content Type(s):
Staff research,
Staff working papers
Topic(s):
Exchange rate regimes,
International topics,
Monetary policy transmission
JEL Code(s):
E,
E3,
E30,
E32,
E6,
E61,
F,
F0,
F02