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Working Paper
Measuring Monetary Policy Spillovers between U.S. and German Bond Yields
In this paper we estimate the magnitude of spillovers between bond markets in the U.S. and Germany following monetary policy communications by the FOMC and the ECB. The identification of policy-related co-movements following FOMC announcements, in particular, can be difficult because many foreign bond markets, including those in Germany, are closed at the time of the announcement. To address this issue we use intraday futures market data to estimate spillovers during a narrow and overlapping event window. We find that about half of the reaction in German domestic yields spills over to U.S. ...
Discussion Paper
Unlocking the Treasury Market through TRACE
The U.S. Treasury market is widely regarded as the deepest and most liquid securities market in the world, playing a critical role in the global economy and in the Federal Reserve’s implementation of monetary policy. Despite the Treasury market’s importance, the official sector has historically had limited access to information on cash market transactions. This data gap was most acutely demonstrated in the investigation of the October 15, 2014, flash event in the Treasury market, as highlighted in the Joint Staff Report (JSR). Following the JSR, steps were taken to improve regulators’ ...
Discussion Paper
Breaking Down TRACE Volumes Further
Following an earlier joint FEDS Note and Liberty Street Economics blog post that examined aggregate trading volume in the Treasury cash market across venues, this post looks at volume across security type, seasoned-ness (time since issuance), and maturity. The analysis, which again relies on transactions recorded in the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority's (FINRA) Trade Reporting and Compliance Engine (TRACE), sheds light on perceptions that some Treasury securities—in particular those that are off-the-run—may not trade very actively. We confirm that most trading volume is made up of ...
Discussion Paper
Monetary Policy Surprises and Monetary Policy Uncertainty
In this note we find that after a given monetary policy surprise, primary dealers--key intermediaries in interest rate markets--tend to adjust their positions in the U.S. Treasury market and their exposures to interest rates more when the prevailing level of policy uncertainty is low than when it is high.
Working Paper
Cheap Talk and the Efficacy of the ECB’s Securities Market Programme: Did Bond Purchases Matter?
In 2010, in response to an ever-worsening fiscal crisis, the ECB began purchasing sovereign debt from troubled euro-area countries through its Securities Market Programme (SMP). This program was designed to improve market functioning and restore the monetary transmission mechanism within the euro area. This paper does not test those ideals. Rather, we test whether SMP purchases systematically lowered peripheral yields and spreads. We find limited evidence of purchase effects but large announcement effects. In addition, on days in which the ECB was believed to have made large purchases, yields ...