Working Papers
2023
September 6, 2023
Good Supervision: Lessons from the Field
Description: Keeping banks safe and sound hinges on good supervision. The bank failures of March 2023 precipitated questions about the effectiveness of supervision. This paper reflects on lessons learned from this banking turmoil and reviews global progress in delivering effective supervision over the past ten years. It finds progress in areas like risk monitoring, stress testing, and business model analysis. Yet, progress has also been hampered by deficiencies in supervisory approaches, techniques, tools, and (use of) corrective and sanctioning powers, as well as by unclear mandates, inadequate powers, and lack of independence and resources. Overcoming these deficiencies requires supervisors to improve their own performance and other policy makers to contribute to ensuring vigilant, independent and accountable supervision.
September 1, 2023
Environmental Policies and Innovation in Renewable Energy
Description: This paper investigates the effect of Climate Change Policies (CCPs) on green innovation, for a sample of 40 advanced and emerging market economies and 5 economic sectors, during the period 2000-2021. Our results suggest that CCPs increase green patents, with the effect increasing gradually over time. The effect is larger for non-market-based policies—such as R&D subsidies—and technology-support instruments, in countries with greater competitiveness and during periods of stronger economic activity—that is, higher GDP growth, lower uncertainty and financial stress. The results based on a difference-in-differences approach suggest that the positive effect of stricter CCPs on green innovation is stronger in sectors with limited financial constraints.
September 1, 2023
Modeling the Reserve Demand to Facilitate Central Bank Operations
Description: Implementing monetary policy largely consists in controlling short-term interest rates which supposes having a good understanding of banks’ demand for liquidity also called “reserves” at the central bank. This work aims to offer a modeling methodology for estimating the demand for reserves that itself is influenced by various macro and market structure variables. The model can help central banks to identify ”stable points” on the demand for reserves, which correspond to the levels of reserves for which the short-term interest rate volatility is minimal. Both parametric and non-parametric approaches are provided, with a particular focus on capturing the modeling uncertainty and, therefore, facilitating scenario analysis. A method is proposed to test the forecasting performances of different approaches and exogenous regressors combination, finding that simpler parametric expressions provide on balance better performances. Adding variables to both parametric and non-parametric provides better explanations and predictions. The proposed methodology is evaluated using data from the Euro system and the US Federal Reserve System.
September 1, 2023
Unconventional Fiscal Policy in Times of High Inflation
Description: The surge in energy prices in 2022 has been a defining factor behind the increase in euro area inflation. We assess the impact of “unconventional fiscal policy,” defined as the set of fiscal measures, possibly expansionary, motivated by a desire to mute the effects of the increase in energy prices and to lower inflation. Overall, we find that these unconventional measures reduced euro area inflation by 1 to 2 percentage points in 2022 and may avoid an undershoot later on. When nonlinearities in the Phillips curve are taken into account, the net effect is to reduce inflation by about 0.5 percentage points in 2021-24, and keep it nearer to its target. About one-third to one-half of the reduction in 2022 reflects the direct effects of the measures on headline inflation, with much of the remainder reflecting the lower pass-through to core inflation. The fiscal measures were deficit-financed but had limited effects on raising inflation by stimulating demand and instead modestly helped to stabilize longer-term inflation expectations. Looking ahead, the prospective decline in inflation in the euro area is partly due to fortunate circumstances, with energy prices falling from their 2022 peaks and their pass-through effects fading, and with less economic overheating than in economies such as the United States. Implementing similar measures in the face of a more persistent increase in energy prices, or in a more overheated economy, would have caused a more persistent rise in core inflation.
August 25, 2023
Delays in Climate Transition Can Increase Financial Tail Risks: A Global Lesson from a Study in Mexico
Description: This paper explores a novel forward-looking approach to study the financial stability implications of climate-related transition risks. We develop an integrated micro-macro framework with a new class of scenario called delayed-uncertain pathways. An additional stochastic financial modeling layer via a jump-diffusion process is considered to capture continuously changing risks, as well as the potential of large/sudden shocks in the financial markets. We applied this approach to study transition risks in the Mexican financial sector. But the implications are global in scope, and the framework is easily adaptable to other countries. We quantify the projections of future distributions of various risk metrics and, hence, the evolving tail risks due to compounding effects from delays in transitioning to a low-carbon economy and the consequent uncertainty of the future policy path. We find that the longer the delays in transition, the larger the future tail financial risks, which could be material to the overall system.
August 25, 2023
Default Risk and Transition Dynamics with Carbon Shocks
Description: Climate mitigation policies are being introduced around the world to limit global warming, generating new risks to the economy. This paper develops a continuous time heterogeneous agents model to study the impact of carbon pricing policy shocks on corporate default risk and the consequent transition dynamics. We derive a closed-form solution to corporate default probability based on firms' intertemporal optimization decisions and explicitly characterize the transition speed. This allows for studying policy implications in an analytically tractable way. The model is calibrated to different US corporate sectors to quantify the heterogeneous effects of carbon price shocks. While carbon-intensive sectors face increased default risks, there are notable asymmetric effects within sectors. Higher carbon prices increase default risk but also induce faster transition towards the new post-shock steady state with a highly non-linear impact. Our results suggest that once a range of possible price shocks are accounted for, the increase in the cost of capital/risk premiums might be sharply different across sectors.
August 25, 2023
Macro-Prudential Stress Test Models: A Survey
Description: In this paper, we survey the rapidly developing literature on macroprudential stress-testing models. The scope of the survey includes models of contagion between banks, models of contagion within the wider financial system including non-bank financial institutions such as investment funds, and models that emphasise the two-way interaction between the financial sector and the real economy. Our aim is two-fold: first, to provide a reference guide of the state-of-the-art for those developing such models; second, to distil insights from this endeavour for policy-makers using these models. In our view, the modelling frontier faces three main challenges: (a) our understanding of the potential for amplification in sectors of the non-bank financial system during periods of stress, (b) multi-sectoral models of the non-bank financial system to analyse the behaviour of the overall demand and supply of liquidity under stress and (c) stress testing models that incorporate comprehensive two-way interactions between the financial system and the real economy. Emerging lessons for policy-makers are that, for a given-sized shock hitting the system, its eventual impact will depend on (a) the size of financial institutions' capital and liquidity buffers, (b) the liquidation strategies financial institutions adopt when they need to raise cash, and (c) the topology of the financial network.
August 25, 2023
An Extended Quarterly Projection Model for the Central Bank of Jordan
Description: The Central Bank of Jordan (CBJ) has developed a Forecasting and Policy Analysis System (FPAS) to serve as a reliable analytical framework for macroeconomic analysis, forecasting and decision-making under a pegged exchange rate regime. At the heart of the FPAS is the CBJ’s extended Jordan Analysis Model (JAM2.0). The model captures the monetary transmission mechanism and provides a consistent monetary policy framework that uses the exchange rate as an effective nominal anchor. This paper outlines the structure and properties of JAM2.0 and emphasizes the enhanced interplay and tradeoffs among monetary, fiscal, and foreign exchange management policies. Simulation and forecasting exercises demonstrate JAM2.0’s ability to match key stylized facts of the Jordanian economy, produce accurate forecasts of important macroeconomic variables, and explain the critical relationships among policies.
August 25, 2023
Macroprudential Policies and Capital Controls Over Financial Cycles
Description: In this paper we assess the effectiveness of macroprudential policies and capital controls in supporting financial stability. We construct a large and granular dataset on prudential and capital flow management measures covering 53 countries during 1996-2016. Conditional on a credit boom, we study the impact of these policy measures on the probability of the credit boom ending in a bust. Our analysis suggests that macroprudential tools are effective from this perspective. If credit booms are accompanied by capital flow surges, in addition to macroprudential tools, capital controls on money market instruments including cross-border interbank lending tend to contribute to reducing the likelihood of a credit bust.
August 25, 2023
Unveiling the Hidden Impact of Urban Land Rents on Total Factor Productivity
Description: This paper addresses the puzzling decline of Total Factor Productivity (TFP) levels in rapidly growing economies, such as Singapore, despite advancements in technology and high GDP per capita growth. The paper proposes that TFP growth is not negative; instead, standard growth decompositions have underestimated TFP growth by overestimating the contribution of capital, failing to account for the substantial part of capital income directed to urban land rents. This leads to an overestimation of changes in capital stock's contribution to growth and thereby an underestimation of TFP growth. A revised decomposition suggests that TFP growth in economies with high land rents and rapid capital stock growth, such as Singapore, has been considerably underestimated: TFP levels have not declined but increased rapidly.