IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecofin/v54y2020ics1062940820301789.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Identification of triggers of U.S. yield curve movements

Author

Listed:
  • Kučera, Adam

Abstract

We present new evidence for understanding the sources of daily movements in U.S. Treasury yields. We use a novel narrative approach combined with Bayesian inference to identify news-based triggers of yield movements between 2001 and 2019. We show that the U.S. macroeconomic news was the core trigger of U.S. Treasury yield volatility over most of the period under analysis. However, the importance of non-macroeconomic news associated with capital flight has increased significantly since 2011, and they became the dominant source of movements in the long end of the U.S. yield curve after 2016. This highlights the growing importance of the U.S. Treasuries as a safe haven asset and implies possible partial loosening of the relation between U.S. Treasury yields and the U.S. business cycle.

Suggested Citation

  • Kučera, Adam, 2020. "Identification of triggers of U.S. yield curve movements," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 54(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecofin:v:54:y:2020:i:c:s1062940820301789
    DOI: 10.1016/j.najef.2020.101288
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1062940820301789
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.najef.2020.101288?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 search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Michael D. Bauer & Glenn D. Rudebusch, 2020. "Interest Rates under Falling Stars," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 110(5), pages 1316-1354, May.
    2. Glenn D. Rudebusch & Eric T. Swanson, 2012. "The Bond Premium in a DSGE Model with Long-Run Real and Nominal Risks," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 4(1), pages 105-143, January.
    3. Michael D. Bauer, 2017. "A New Conundrum in the Bond Market?," FRBSF Economic Letter, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.
    4. Avdjiev, Stefan & Gambacorta, Leonardo & Goldberg, Linda S. & Schiaffi, Stefano, 2020. "The shifting drivers of global liquidity," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).
    5. Ben S. Bernanke & Vincent R. Reinhart & Brian P. Sack, 2004. "Monetary Policy Alternatives at the Zero Bound: An Empirical Assessment," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 35(2), pages 1-100.
    6. Byrne, Joseph P. & Fazio, Giorgio & Fiess, Norbert, 2012. "Interest rate co-movements, global factors and the long end of the term spread," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(1), pages 183-192.
    7. Diebold, Francis X. & Li, Canlin, 2006. "Forecasting the term structure of government bond yields," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 130(2), pages 337-364, February.
    8. Craine Roger & Martin Vance L, 2009. "Interest Rate Conundrum," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 9(1), pages 1-29, March.
    9. Scott Joslin & Kenneth J. Singleton & Haoxiang Zhu, 2011. "A New Perspective on Gaussian Dynamic Term Structure Models," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 24(3), pages 926-970.
    10. Qiang Dai & Thomas Philippon, 2005. "Fiscal Policy and the Term Structure of Interest Rates," NBER Working Papers 11574, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Scott Joslin & Marcel Priebsch & Kenneth J. Singleton, 2014. "Risk Premiums in Dynamic Term Structure Models with Unspanned Macro Risks," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 69(3), pages 1197-1233, June.
    12. David K. Backus & Jonathan H. Wright, 2007. "Cracking the Conundrum," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 38(1), pages 293-329.
    13. John Ammer & Alexandra Tabova & Stijn Claessens, 2018. "Searching for Yield Abroad: Risk-Taking through Foreign Investment in U.S. Bonds," 2018 Meeting Papers 960, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    14. Jonathan H. Wright, 2011. "Term Premia and Inflation Uncertainty: Empirical Evidence from an International Panel Dataset," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(4), pages 1514-1534, June.
    15. Julio, Brandon & Yook, Youngsuk, 2016. "Policy uncertainty, irreversibility, and cross-border flows of capital," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 13-26.
    16. John H. Cochrane & Monika Piazzesi, 2005. "Bond Risk Premia," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(1), pages 138-160, March.
    17. Timothy Cogley & Thomas J. Sargent, 2005. "Drift and Volatilities: Monetary Policies and Outcomes in the Post WWII U.S," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 8(2), pages 262-302, April.
    18. Michiel De Pooter & Francesco Ravazzolo & Dick van Dijk, 2010. "Term structure forecasting using macro factors and forecast combination," International Finance Discussion Papers 993, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    19. Ang, Andrew & Piazzesi, Monika, 2003. "A no-arbitrage vector autoregression of term structure dynamics with macroeconomic and latent variables," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(4), pages 745-787, May.
    20. Sydney C. Ludvigson & Serena Ng, 2009. "Macro Factors in Bond Risk Premia," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(12), pages 5027-5067, December.
    21. Don H. Kim & Jonathan H. Wright, 2005. "An arbitrage-free three-factor term structure model and the recent behavior of long-term yields and distant-horizon forward rates," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2005-33, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    22. Unknown, 2005. "Forward," 2005 Conference: Slovenia in the EU - Challenges for Agriculture, Food Science and Rural Affairs, November 10-11, 2005, Moravske Toplice, Slovenia 183804, Slovenian Association of Agricultural Economists (DAES).
    23. John Y. Campbell & Robert J. Shiller, 1991. "Yield Spreads and Interest Rate Movements: A Bird's Eye View," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 58(3), pages 495-514.
    24. Anna Cieslak & Pavol Povala, 2015. "Expected Returns in Treasury Bonds," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 28(10), pages 2859-2901.
    25. Michael D. Bauer & James D. Hamilton, 2018. "Robust Bond Risk Premia," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 31(2), pages 399-448.
    26. John Ammer & Alexandra Tabova & Caleb Wroblewski, 2018. "Searching for yield abroad: risk-taking through foreign investment in U.S. bonds," BIS Working Papers 687, Bank for International Settlements.
    27. Nelson, Charles R & Siegel, Andrew F, 1987. "Parsimonious Modeling of Yield Curves," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 60(4), pages 473-489, October.
    28. Diebold, Francis X. & Rudebusch, Glenn D. & Borag[caron]an Aruoba, S., 2006. "The macroeconomy and the yield curve: a dynamic latent factor approach," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 131(1-2), pages 309-338.
    29. Darrell Duffie & Rui Kan, 1996. "A Yield‐Factor Model Of Interest Rates," Mathematical Finance, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 6(4), pages 379-406, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Richard K. Crump & Stefano Eusepi & Emanuel Moench, 2016. "The term structure of expectations and bond yields," Staff Reports 775, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    2. Luis Ceballos & Alberto Naudon & Damián Romero, 2016. "Nominal term structure and term premia: evidence from Chile," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(29), pages 2721-2735, June.
    3. Rui Liu, 2019. "Forecasting Bond Risk Premia with Unspanned Macroeconomic Information," Quarterly Journal of Finance (QJF), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 9(01), pages 1-62, March.
    4. Michael D. Bauer & Glenn D. Rudebusch, 2020. "Interest Rates under Falling Stars," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 110(5), pages 1316-1354, May.
    5. Doshi, Hitesh & Jacobs, Kris & Liu, Rui, 2018. "Macroeconomic determinants of the term structure: Long-run and short-run dynamics," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 99-122.
    6. Li, Junye & Sarno, Lucio & Zinna, Gabriele, 2024. "Risks and risk premia in the US Treasury market," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    7. P. Byrne, Joseph & Cao, Shuo & Korobilis, Dimitris, 2015. "Term Structure Dynamics, Macro-Finance Factors and Model Uncertainty," 2007 Annual Meeting, July 29-August 1, 2007, Portland, Oregon TN 2015-71, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    8. Refet S. Gürkaynak & Jonathan H. Wright, 2012. "Macroeconomics and the Term Structure," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 50(2), pages 331-367, June.
    9. P. Byrne, Joseph & Cao, Shuo & Korobilis, Dimitris, 2015. "Term Structure Dynamics, Macro-Finance Factors and Model Uncertainty," SIRE Discussion Papers 2015-71, Scottish Institute for Research in Economics (SIRE).
    10. Fernandes, Marcelo & Vieira, Fausto, 2019. "A dynamic Nelson–Siegel model with forward-looking macroeconomic factors for the yield curve in the US," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 1-1.
    11. Adrian, Tobias & Crump, Richard K. & Moench, Emanuel, 2013. "Pricing the term structure with linear regressions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(1), pages 110-138.
    12. Christensen, Bent Jesper & van der Wel, Michel, 2019. "An asset pricing approach to testing general term structure models," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 134(1), pages 165-191.
    13. Christos Ioannidis & Kook Ka, 2021. "Economic Policy Uncertainty and Bond Risk Premia," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 53(6), pages 1479-1522, September.
    14. Liu, Yan & Wu, Jing Cynthia, 2021. "Reconstructing the yield curve," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 142(3), pages 1395-1425.
    15. Brand, Claus & Goy, Gavin W & Lemke, Wolfgang, 2020. "Natural rate chimera and bond pricing reality," VfS Annual Conference 2020 (Virtual Conference): Gender Economics 224546, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    16. Caio Almeida & Kym Ardison & Daniela Kubudi & Axel Simonsen & José Vicente, 2018. "Forecasting Bond Yields with Segmented Term Structure Models," Journal of Financial Econometrics, Oxford University Press, vol. 16(1), pages 1-33.
    17. Antonio Gargano & Davide Pettenuzzo & Allan Timmermann, 2019. "Bond Return Predictability: Economic Value and Links to the Macroeconomy," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 65(2), pages 508-540, February.
    18. Berardi, Andrea & Plazzi, Alberto, 2022. "Dissecting the yield curve: The international evidence," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).
    19. Yung, Julieta, 2021. "Can interest rate factors explain exchange rate fluctuations?," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 34-56.
    20. Jing-Zhi Huang & Zhan Shi, 2023. "Machine-Learning-Based Return Predictors and the Spanning Controversy in Macro-Finance," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(3), pages 1780-1804, March.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Interest rate; Macrofinance model; Nelson–Siegel; Yield curve;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C38 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Classification Methdos; Cluster Analysis; Principal Components; Factor Analysis
    • C58 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling - - - Financial Econometrics
    • E43 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Interest Rates: Determination, Term Structure, and Effects
    • E44 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Financial Markets and the Macroeconomy

    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:ecofin:v:54:y:2020:i:c:s1062940820301789. 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/inca/620163 .

    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.