IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ecb/ecbwps/20222750.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Euro area monetary policy and TARGET balances: a trilogy

Author

Listed:
  • Eisenschmidt, Jens
  • Kedan, Danielle
  • Schmitz, Martin

Abstract

The growth in TARGET balances after 2009 has given rise to intense academic and public debate. Our paper offers a systematic exposition of the necessary conditions for TARGET balances to emerge and provides a clear link to monetary policy. We show that large TARGET balances can only arise with excess liquidity. The interpretation of TARGET balances therefore depends on the monetary policy context in which excess liquidity is created. We distinguish three phases of TARGET balances growth and propose some easy-to-derive metrics for policy makers and academics to assess developments in TARGET balances. We develop a comprehensive econometric framework to account for relevant factors driving TARGET balances in the different phases. We find that while financial market stress and economic imbalances were the drivers of TARGET balances during the great financial and sovereign debt crises, the implementation of Eurosystem asset purchases was the driving force since March 2015. As excess liquidity is likely to persist on account of higher demand for central bank reserves compared to the pre-crisis period, TARGET balances have the potential to remain sizeable in the future. JEL Classification: E42, E58, F32

Suggested Citation

  • Eisenschmidt, Jens & Kedan, Danielle & Schmitz, Martin, 2022. "Euro area monetary policy and TARGET balances: a trilogy," Working Paper Series 2750, European Central Bank.
    • Handle: RePEc:ecb:ecbwps:20222750
    Note: 2696070
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.ecb.europa.eu//pub/pdf/scpwps/ecb.wp2750~6e6363c570.en.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Stephen Cecchetti & Robert McCauley & Patrick McGuire, 2012. "Interpreting TARGET2 balances," BIS Working Papers 393, Bank for International Settlements.
    2. Hans-Werner Sinn, 2012. "Die Target-Falle: Gefahren für unser Geld und unsere Kinder," Books, by Staff of the ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 2012001.
    3. Cour-Thimann Philippine, 2013. "Monetary policy and redistribution: information from central bank balance sheets in the Euro area and the US," Review of Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 64(3), pages 293-324, December.
    4. Kedan, Danielle & Veghazy, Alexia Ventula, 2021. "The implications of liquidity regulation for monetary policy implementation and the central bank balance sheet size: an empirical analysis of the euro area," Working Paper Series 2515, European Central Bank.
    5. Hans-Werner Sinn & Timo Wollmershäuser, 2012. "Target loans, current account balances and capital flows: the ECB’s rescue facility," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 19(4), pages 468-508, August.
    6. Raphael A. Auer, 2014. "What drives TARGET2 balances? Evidence from a panel analysis [What drives Target2 balances? Evidence from a panel analysis]," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 29(77), pages 139-197.
    7. Peter M. Garber, 1998. "Notes on the Role of TARGET in a Stage III Crisis," NBER Working Papers 6619, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Clemens Fuest & Hans-Werner Sinn, 2018. "Target Risks without Euro Exits," CESifo Forum, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 19(04), pages 36-45, December.
    9. Carmen M. Reinhart, 2019. "Financial crises: past and future," Business Economics, Palgrave Macmillan;National Association for Business Economics, vol. 54(1), pages 3-15, January.
    10. Karl Whelan, 2014. "TARGET2 and central bank balance sheets [The economics of TARGET2 balances]," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 29(77), pages 79-137.
    11. Alexander L. Wolman, 2013. "Federal Reserve Interdistrict Settlement," Economic Quarterly, Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, issue 2Q, pages 117-141.
    12. Bindseil, Ulrich & König, Philipp Johann, 2011. "The economics of TARGET2 balances," SFB 649 Discussion Papers 2011-035, Humboldt University Berlin, Collaborative Research Center 649: Economic Risk.
    13. PhilippineCour-Thimann, 2013. "CESifo Forum Special Issue April 2013: Target Balances and the Crisis in the Euro Area," CESifo Forum, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 0, pages 05-50, May.
    14. Jens Klose & Benjamin Weigert, 2012. "Das Verrechnungssystem der Federal Reserve und seine Übertragbarkeit auf den Euroraum," Wirtschaftsdienst, Springer;ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 92(4), pages 243-250, April.
    15. repec:oup:ecpoli:v:29:y:2014:i:77:p:79-137 is not listed on IDEAS
    16. Mr. Steven T Phillips & Mr. Luis Catão & Mr. Luca A Ricci & Mr. Rudolfs Bems & Ms. Mitali Das & Mr. Julian Di Giovanni & Ms. Filiz D Unsal & Marola Castillo & Jungjin Lee & Jair Rodriguez & Mr. Mauric, 2013. "The External Balance Assessment (EBA) Methodology," IMF Working Papers 2013/272, International Monetary Fund.
    17. Eisenschmidt, Jens & Kedan, Danielle & Schmitz, Martin & Adalid, Ramón & Papsdorf, Patrick, 2017. "The Eurosystem’s asset purchase programme and TARGET balances," Occasional Paper Series 196, European Central Bank.
    18. repec:oup:ecpoli:v:29:y:2014:i:77:p:139-197 is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Bergant, Katharina & Fidora, Michael & Schmitz, Martin, 2018. "International capital flows at the security level – evidence from the ECB’s asset purchase programme," ECMI Papers 13926, Centre for European Policy Studies.
    20. Tapking, Jens & Eisenschmidt, Jens, 2009. "Liquidity risk premia in unsecured interbank money markets," Working Paper Series 1025, European Central Bank.
    21. Eisenschmidt, Jens & Kedan, Danielle & Tietz, Robin Darius, 2018. "Measuring fragmentation in the euro area unsecured overnight interbank money market," Economic Bulletin Articles, European Central Bank, vol. 5.
    22. Philippine Cour-Thimann, 2013. "CESifo Forum Special Issue April 2013: Target Balances and the Crisis in the Euro Area," CESifo Forum, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 0(1), pages 05-50, May.
    23. Hans-Werner Sinn, 2012. "Die Target-Falle: Gefahren für unser Geld und unsere Kinder," Books, by Staff of the ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 201210, April.
    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. Fagan, Gabriel & McNelis, Paul D., 2020. "Sudden stops in the Euro Area: Does monetary union matter?," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 108(C).
    2. Gabriel Fagan & Paul McNelis, 2014. "TARGET Balances and Macroeconomic Adjustment to Sudden Stops in the Euro Area," The Institute for International Integration Studies Discussion Paper Series iiisdp465, IIIS, revised Dec 2014.
    3. Astarita, Caterina & Purificato, Francesco, 2013. "TARGET2 imbalances and the need for a lender of last resort," MPRA Paper 51124, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Francesco Purificato & Caterina Astarita, 2015. "TARGET2 Imbalances and the ECB as Lender of Last Resort," IJFS, MDPI, vol. 3(4), pages 1-28, October.
    5. Bofinger, Peter & Feld, Lars P. & Schmidt, Christoph M. & Schnabel, Isabel & Wieland, Volker, 2018. "Vor wichtigen wirtschaftspolitischen Weichenstellungen. Jahresgutachten 2018/19 [Setting the Right Course for Economic Policy. Annual Report 2018/19]," Annual Economic Reports / Jahresgutachten, German Council of Economic Experts / Sachverständigenrat zur Begutachtung der gesamtwirtschaftlichen Entwicklung, volume 127, number 201819, February.
    6. Eisenschmidt, Jens & Kedan, Danielle & Schmitz, Martin & Adalid, Ramón & Papsdorf, Patrick, 2017. "The Eurosystem’s asset purchase programme and TARGET balances," Occasional Paper Series 196, European Central Bank.
    7. Sinn Hans-Werner, 2019. "Der Streit um die Targetsalden : Kommentar zu Martin Hellwigs Artikel „Target-Falle oder Empörungsfalle?“," Perspektiven der Wirtschaftspolitik, De Gruyter, vol. 20(3), pages 170-217, September.
    8. Marcel Fratzscher & Philipp König & Claudia Lambert, 2013. "TARGET Balances - An Anchor of Stability," DIW Economic Bulletin, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research, vol. 3(11/12), pages 3-11.
    9. Eichengreen, Barry & Mehl, Arnaud & Chitu, Livia & Richardson, Gary, 2015. "Mutual Assistance between Federal Reserve Banks: 1913–1960 as Prolegomena to the TARGET2 Debate," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 75(3), pages 621-659, September.
    10. Giuseppe Bertola & John Driffill & Harold James & Hans-Werner Sinn & Jan-Egbert Sturm & Ákos Valentinyi, 2014. "Chapter 2: Switzerland: Relic of the Past, Model for the Future?," EEAG Report on the European Economy, CESifo, vol. 0, pages 55-73, February.
    11. Chmielewski Tomasz & Sławiński Andrzej, 2019. "Lessons from TARGET2 imbalances: The case for the ECB being a lender of last resort," Economics and Business Review, Sciendo, vol. 5(2), pages 48-63, June.
    12. Cheung, Yin-Wong & Steinkamp, Sven & Westermann, Frank, 2020. "Capital flight to Germany: Two alternative measures," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).
    13. Marcel Fratzscher & Philipp König & Claudia Lambert, 2013. "Target-Salden - ein Anker der Stabilität," DIW Wochenbericht, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research, vol. 80(44), pages 19-28.
    14. Eger, Thomas & Weise, Peter, 2020. "Die Target-Salden in der Eurozone: "Falle" oder Scheinproblem?," Discussion Papers 1/20, Europa-Kolleg Hamburg, Institute for European Integration.
    15. Francesco Papadia, 2014. "Operational Aspects of a Hypothetical Demise of the Euro," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 52(5), pages 1090-1102, September.
    16. PhilippineCour-Thimann, 2013. "CESifo Forum Special Issue April 2013: Target Balances and the Crisis in the Euro Area," CESifo Forum, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 0, pages 05-50, May.
    17. Alexander Erler & Stefan Hohberger, 2016. "Editor's Choice TARGET2: How Costly is Buying Time?," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo Group, vol. 62(3), pages 491-505.
    18. Dominique Jacob, 2013. "Quels sont les enseignements de l'histoire du fédéralisme américain pour la zone euro actuelle ?," Larefi Working Papers 1305, Larefi, Université Bordeaux 4.
    19. Minenna, Marcello, 2022. "Target 2 determinants: The role of Balance of Payments imbalances in the long run," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    20. Dominique Jacob, 2013. "Quels sont les enseignements de l'histoire du fédéralisme américain pour la zone euro actuelle ?," Working Papers hal-00863029, HAL.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    asset purchase programme; balance of payments; excess liquidity; TARGET2;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E42 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Monetary Sytsems; Standards; Regimes; Government and the Monetary System
    • E58 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Central Banks and Their Policies
    • F32 - International Economics - - International Finance - - - Current Account Adjustment; Short-term Capital Movements

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:ecb:ecbwps:20222750. 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: Official Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/emieude.html .

    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.