IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/dyncon/v124y2021ics0165188920302177.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A model for policy interest rates

Author

Listed:
  • Seibert, Armin
  • Sirchenko, Andrei
  • Müller, Gernot

Abstract

This paper introduces a model that addresses the key worldwide features of modern monetary policy making: the discreteness of policy interest rates both in magnitude and in timing, the preponderance of status quo decisions, monetary policy inertia and policy regime switching. We capture them by developing a new dynamic ordered-choice model with switching among three latent policy regimes (easing, neutral and tightening). The simulations and an application to the federal funds rate target demonstrate that ignoring these features leads to biased estimates, worse in- and out-of-sample predictions, and a qualitatively different inference. Using all Federal Open Market Committee’s (FOMC) decisions made both at scheduled and unscheduled meetings as sample observations, we model the Federal Reserve’s response to real-time data available right before each meeting. The new model, fitted for the Greenspan’s tenure, detects oscillating switches among latent regimes, identifies three types of status quo decisions, correctly predicts out of sample 90% of the next 111 FOMC decisions on the target rate, and clearly outperforms the linear models (including the Taylor rule), the conventional ordered probit and other discrete-choice models from the literature.

Suggested Citation

  • Seibert, Armin & Sirchenko, Andrei & Müller, Gernot, 2021. "A model for policy interest rates," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:dyncon:v:124:y:2021:i:c:s0165188920302177
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jedc.2020.104049
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0165188920302177
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jedc.2020.104049?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    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. Ben S. Bernanke & Kenneth N. Kuttner, 2005. "What Explains the Stock Market's Reaction to Federal Reserve Policy?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(3), pages 1221-1257, June.
    2. George Monokroussos, 2011. "Dynamic Limited Dependent Variable Modeling and U.S. Monetary Policy," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 43(2‐3), pages 519-534, March.
    3. Daniel L. Thornton, 2005. "When did the FOMC begin targeting the federal funds rate? what the verbatim transcripts tell us," Working Papers 2004-015, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.
    4. Davutyan, Nurhan & Parke, William R, 1995. "The Operations of the Bank of England, 1890-1908: A Dynamic Probit Approach," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 27(4), pages 1099-1112, November.
    5. James D. Hamilton & Oscar Jorda, 2002. "A Model of the Federal Funds Rate Target," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 110(5), pages 1135-1167, October.
    6. Bikbov, Ruslan & Chernov, Mikhail, 2013. "Monetary policy regimes and the term structure of interest rates," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 174(1), pages 27-43.
    7. Frederic S. Mishkin, 1990. "The Information in the Longer Maturity Term Structure about Future Inflation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 105(3), pages 815-828.
    8. Gurkaynak, Refet S. & Sack, Brian T. & Swanson, Eric P., 2007. "Market-Based Measures of Monetary Policy Expectations," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 25, pages 201-212, April.
    9. Christopher A. Sims & Tao Zha, 2006. "Were There Regime Switches in U.S. Monetary Policy?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(1), pages 54-81, March.
    10. Vanderhart, Peter G., 2000. "The Federal Reserve's Reaction Function under Greenspan: An Ordinal Probit Analysis," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 22(4), pages 631-644, October.
    11. Joel T. Krueger & Kenneth N. Kuttner, 1996. "The Fed funds futures rate as a predictor of federal reserve policy," Journal of Futures Markets, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 16(8), pages 865-879, December.
    12. Michael J. Dueker, 1999. "Measuring monetary policy inertia in target Fed funds rate changes," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, vol. 81(Sep), pages 3-10.
    13. Rudebusch, Glenn D, 1998. "Do Measures of Monetary Policy in a VAR Make Sense? A Reply," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 39(4), pages 943-948, November.
    14. Brooks, Robert & Harris, Mark N. & Spencer, Christopher, 2012. "Inflated ordered outcomes," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 117(3), pages 683-686.
    15. 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.
    16. Harris, Mark N. & Zhao, Xueyan, 2007. "A zero-inflated ordered probit model, with an application to modelling tobacco consumption," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 141(2), pages 1073-1099, December.
    17. Monika Piazzesi, 2005. "Bond Yields and the Federal Reserve," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 113(2), pages 311-344, April.
    18. Eichengreen, Barry & Watson, Mark W & Grossman, Richard S, 1985. "Bank Rate Policy under the Interwar Gold Standard: A Dynamic Probit Model," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 95(379), pages 725-745, September.
    19. Hu, Ling & Phillips, Peter C. B., 2004. "Nonstationary discrete choice," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 120(1), pages 103-138, May.
    20. Hyeongwoo Kim & John Jackson & Richard Saba, 2009. "Forecasting the FOMC's interest rate setting behavior: a further analysis," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(2), pages 145-165.
    21. van den Hauwe, Sjoerd & Paap, Richard & van Dijk, Dick, 2013. "Bayesian forecasting of federal funds target rate decisions," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 19-40.
    22. 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.
    23. Estrella, Arturo & Hardouvelis, Gikas A, 1991. "The Term Structure as a Predictor of Real Economic Activity," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(2), pages 555-576, June.
    24. Heikki Kauppi, 2012. "Predicting the Direction of the Fed's Target Rate," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 31(1), pages 47-67, January.
    25. Monika Piazzesi, 2002. "The Fed and Interest Rates - A High-Frequency Identification," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(2), pages 90-95, May.
    26. Stefan Gerlach, 2007. "Interest Rate Setting by the ECB, 1999-2006: Words and Deeds," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 3(3), pages 1-46, September.
    27. Rudebusch, Glenn D, 1998. "Do Measures of Monetary Policy in a VAR Make Sense?," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 39(4), pages 907-931, November.
    28. Grammig, Joachim & Kehrle, Kerstin, 2008. "A new marked point process model for the federal funds rate target: Methodology and forecast evaluation," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 32(7), pages 2370-2396, July.
    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. Farvaque, Etienne & Malan, Franck & Stanek, Piotr, 2020. "Misplaced childhood: When recession children grow up as central bankers," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 110(C).

    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. 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.
    2. van den Hauwe, Sjoerd & Paap, Richard & van Dijk, Dick, 2013. "Bayesian forecasting of federal funds target rate decisions," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 19-40.
    3. Dick van Dijk & Robin L. Lumsdaine & Michel van der Wel, 2014. "Market Set-Up in Advance of Federal Reserve Policy Decisions," NBER Working Papers 19814, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Piazzesi, Monika & Swanson, Eric T., 2008. "Futures prices as risk-adjusted forecasts of monetary policy," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(4), pages 677-691, May.
    5. O. David Gulley & Jahangir Sultan, 2011. "Economics, politics and the federal funds markets: does the Fed play politics?," Applied Financial Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(14), pages 1005-1019.
    6. Refet S. Gürkaynak, 2005. "Using federal funds futures contracts for monetary policy analysis," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2005-29, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    7. Lee A. Smales, 2013. "The Determinants of RBA Target Rate Decisions: A Choice Modelling Approach," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 89(287), pages 556-569, December.
    8. Refet S Gürkaynak & Brian Sack & Eric Swanson, 2005. "Do Actions Speak Louder Than Words? The Response of Asset Prices to Monetary Policy Actions and Statements," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 1(1), May.
    9. Rebeca I. Muñoz Torres & David Shepherd, 2014. "Inflation Targeting and the Consistency of Monetary Policy Decisions in Mexico: an Empirical Analysis with Discrete Choice Models," Manchester School, University of Manchester, vol. 82, pages 21-46, December.
    10. Nicholas Taylor, 2010. "The Determinants of Future U.S. Monetary Policy: High‐Frequency Evidence," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 42(2‐3), pages 399-420, March.
    11. Daniel L. Thornton, 2014. "The identification of the response of interest rates to monetary policy actions using market-based measures of monetary policy shocks," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 66(1), pages 67-87, January.
    12. Pauwels, Laurent L. & Vasnev, Andrey L., 2016. "A note on the estimation of optimal weights for density forecast combinations," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 32(2), pages 391-397.
    13. Gurkaynak, Refet S. & Sack, Brian T. & Swanson, Eric P., 2007. "Market-Based Measures of Monetary Policy Expectations," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 25, pages 201-212, April.
    14. Farvaque, Etienne & Malan, Franck & Stanek, Piotr, 2020. "Misplaced childhood: When recession children grow up as central bankers," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 110(C).
    15. Marfatia, Hardik A., 2015. "Monetary policy's time-varying impact on the US bond markets: Role of financial stress and risks," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 103-123.
    16. Lahiri, Kajal & Yang, Liu, 2013. "Forecasting Binary Outcomes," Handbook of Economic Forecasting, in: G. Elliott & C. Granger & A. Timmermann (ed.), Handbook of Economic Forecasting, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 1025-1106, Elsevier.
    17. Hyeongwoo Kim & Wen Shi, 2014. "The Determinants of the Benchmark Interest Rates in China: A Discrete Choice Model Approach," Auburn Economics Working Paper Series auwp2014-12, Department of Economics, Auburn University.
    18. Pérez Quirós, Gabriel & Sicilia, Jorge, 2002. "Is the European Central Bank (and the United States Federal Reserve) predictable?," Working Paper Series 192, European Central Bank.
    19. Mamun, Abdullah & Hassan, M. Kabir, 2014. "What explains the lack of monetary policy influence on bank holding companies?," Review of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 23(4), pages 227-235.
    20. Faust, Jon & Swanson, Eric T. & Wright, Jonathan H., 2004. "Identifying VARS based on high frequency futures data," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(6), pages 1107-1131, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Federal funds rate target; FOMC; Discrete ordered choice; Endogenous regime switching; MCMC; Gibbs sampler; Data augmentation; Autoregressive ordered probit; Real-time data;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C11 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Bayesian Analysis: General
    • C34 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Truncated and Censored Models; Switching Regression Models
    • C35 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Discrete Regression and Qualitative Choice Models; Discrete Regressors; Proportions
    • 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:eee:dyncon:v:124:y:2021:i:c:s0165188920302177. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jedc .

    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.