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The 1995 British two pound "Dove" coin The Bank of England's chief economist Andrew Haldane recently called for central banks to think more imaginatively about how to deal with the technological constraint imposed by the zero lower bound on interest rates. Haldane says that the lower bound isn't a passing problem. Rather, there is a growing probability that when policy makers need three percentage points of headroom to cushion the effects of a typical recession, that headroom just won't be there. Haldane pans higher inflation targets and further quantitative easing as ways to slacken the bound, preferring to focus on negative interest rates on paper currency, a topic which gets discussed often on this blog. He mentions the classic Silvio Gesell stamp tax (which I discussed here ), an all out ban on cash as advocated by Ken Rogoff, and Miles Kimball's crawling peg (see here ). According to Haldane, the problem with Gesell's tax, Rogoff's ban ( pdf ), a...

A common argument against the Fed raising interest rates next week is the asymmetry in risks that it faces. If it keeps rates low too long and sets off inflation, no problem: it can quickly hike rates a few times to bring prices back in line. However, if it boosts rates too early and an unintended slowdown sets in, the Fed won't have room to cut a few times in order to fix its mistake. That's because the Fed is at the zero lower bound , the edge of the world in monetary policy terms. To avoid this conundrum, the Fed should hold off as long as possible before raising, at least until it "sees the whites of inflation's eyes." As Paul Krugman points out , the asymmetry argument is only a recent one. Historically U.S. interest rates have hovered far above zero. If the Fed made a mistake, it didn't have to worry about falling off the edge of the world in order to fix the situation, it could simply ratchet rates down a few times. Rather than waiting till the last m...

National Bank of Greece depository receipt certificate ( source ) If you're like me and you like to: 1) explore anomalies in markets; and 2) mix equity analysis with monetary analysis, then you'll like this post. A sneak peak: by the end, we'll be able to use equity markets to figure out the unofficial exchange rate between a Greek euro and non-Greek euro. For the last few weeks shares of Greek banks have diverged dramatically from their overlying depository receipts (see chart below). A bit of background first. A depository receipt is much like an exchange-traded fund, except where an ETF holds a bundle of different stocks, a depository receipt represents just one stock. That stock is usually listed on an out-of-the-way market (like Greece), whereas the depository receipt trades on a major exchange like New York. Investors interested in owning a foreign stock can avoid currency conversion costs and foreign settlement problems and instead purchase the New York-listed depos...

Recent market action is a good reminder of the asymmetry in markets. In general, stock market rises don't look like stock market declines. Stock indexes slowly eke out gains over a period of months, but lose all of those gains just a few days. There are plenty of famous meltdowns in stocks, including 1914, 1929, 1987, and 2008, but almost no famous "melt ups." Just like the Inuit have multiple words for snow because they are surrounded by the stuff, equity commentators have many words for crashes (panics, selloff, etc). These events are not uncommon. In the same way that many indigenous African languages have no word for snow, we lack a good word to describe one or two day melt-ups in equity markets since these aren't part of our landscape. There are a number of trader's adages that describe this pattern, including bulls walk up the stairs, bears jump out the window and variations on that theme. In the economic literature, this phenomenon is referred to as negati...

It's been a while since I blogged about Canadian monetary policy, but Luke Kawa's recent tweet on the topic of Canada's effective lower bound got me thinking. BoC has referred to 0.25% as its "effective lower bound" -- Shenfeld suggested that any lower, BoC thinks there'll be problems in money mkts — Luke Kawa (@LJKawa) August 4, 2015 Luke is referring here to CIBC chief economist Avery Shenfeld's recent missive on how the Bank of Canada might react if the Canadian economy's losing streak were to continue. According to Shenfeld, the Bank of Canada has one final quarter point cut left in its quiver—from 0.5% to 0.25%. Should the bleeding continue, Governor Stephen Poloz can then turn to forward guidance and only when that has been exhausted will quantitative easing become a possibility. Really? The Bank of Canada can't go below 0.25%? Has Shenfeld not been following what has been occurring outside Canada's borders over the last twelve months? ...

1934 Chinese silver dollar with Sun Yat-sen on the obverse side. The ship may be in freshwater. I have been hitting my head against the wall these last few weeks trying to understand Chinese monetary policy, a project that I've probably made harder than necessary by starting in the distant past, specifically with the nation's experience during the Great Depression. Taking a reading break, I was surprised to see that Paul Krugman' s recent post on the topic of freshwater macro had surprising parallels to my own admittedly esoteric readings on Chinese monetary history. Unlike most nations, China was on a silver standard during the Great Depression. The consensus view, at least up until it was challenged by the freshwater economists that people Krugman's post, had always been that the silver standard protected China from the first stage of the Great Depression, only to betray the nation by imposing on it a terrible internal devaluation as silver prices rose. This would ev...

  Of all the axioms of utility theory, the completeness axiom is perhaps the most questionable.    - Robert Aumann, Nobel Prize Winner One of the reasons you keep a well-stocked wallet in your pocket is because you don't know very much about yourself. Know thyself , as the Greeks say, and you can skimp on the amount of media-of-exchange you keep on hand. Greater self-awareness leads to a cleaner "mapping out" of an individual's tastes and the preferred timetable for the enjoyment of those tastes. For instance, a moment of self reflection might lead you to conclude that pistachio ice cream at 8:31 PM next Friday is the best possible state of the world. If a complete set of futures markets exists, you can purchase a futures contract that is time stamped to deliver pistachio ice cream at 8:31 PM Friday, guaranteeing ahead of time that your tastes will be satisfied. The problem is that introspection is difficult. We simply don't have the time, knowledge, or energy to ...