Search

This note investigates whether the recent weakness in inflation in Canada can be related to global factors not included in the current staff analytical framework (domestic slack, movements in commodity prices and in the exchange rate). A global common factor for inflation among selected advanced economies appears to contain marginal information for Canadian inflation beyond what is found in movements in commodity prices and the exchange rate.

In this note, we find that valuation effects can act as an important stabilizer, strengthening Canada’s net external wealth when its economic outlook worsens relative to that of other countries.

This paper attempts to borrow the tradition of estimating policy reaction functions in monetary policy literature and apply it to capital controls policy literature. Using a novel weekly dataset on capital controls policy actions in 21 emerging economies over the period 1 January 2001 to 31 December 2015, I examine the mercantilist and macroprudential motivations for capital control policies.

This paper contributes to the debate on the magnitude of exchange rate elasticities by providing a set of price and quantity elasticities for 51 advanced and emerging-market economies. Specifically, for each of these countries we report the elasticity of trade prices and trade quantities on both the export and on the import sides, as well as the reaction of the trade balance.

Using the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) Locational Banking Statistics data on bilateral bank claims from 1995 to 2014, we analyze the impact of monetary policy on cross-border bank flows. We find that monetary policy in a source country is an important determinant of cross-border bank flows.

This paper develops a model of firm heterogeneity, technological adoption, and urbanization. In the model, welfare is measured by household real income, and urbanization is measured by population density. I use the model to derive statistics that measure the effect of a new technology on productivity, welfare, and urbanization.

We compare the Federal Reserve’s asset purchase programs with those implemented by the Bank of England and the Swedish Riksbank, and the Swiss National Bank’s reserve expansion program.

This note explores the drivers behind the recent increase in the US participation rate in the labour market and assesses the likelihood of a similar gain in Canada. The growth in the US participation rate has largely been due to a pickup in the participation of prime-age workers following a post-recession decline.

This note examines the relatively subdued pace of wage growth in Canada since the commodity price decline in 2014 and assesses whether the weakness is attributable to cyclical (e.g., labour market slack) or structural factors (e.g., resource reallocation and demographic change).

Since 2012, business investment growth has slowed considerably in advanced economies, averaging a little less than 2 per cent versus the 4 per cent growth rates experienced in the period leading up to crisis. Several recent studies have attributed a large part of the weakness in business investment to cyclical factors, including soft aggregate demand, and, to a lesser degree, heightened uncertainty and tighter financial conditions.