A Financial Conditions Index for the United States Staff Discussion Paper 2009-11 Kimberly Beaton, René Lalonde, Corinne Luu The financial crisis of 2007–09 has highlighted the importance of developments in financial conditions for real economic activity. The authors estimate the effect of current and past shocks to financial variables on U.S. GDP growth by constructing two growthbased financial conditions indexes (FCIs) that measure the contribution to quarterly (annualized) GDP growth from financial conditions. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff discussion papers Research Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles, Monetary and financial indicators, Monetary conditions index, Recent economic and financial developments JEL Code(s): E, E3, E32, E4, E44, E47, E5, E51
May 17, 2001 Reforming the International Financial System Bank of Canada Review - Spring 2001 James Powell This article examines the efforts of the major advanced countries to strengthen the international financial system in order to avoid financial crises such as those that occurred in emerging-market economies in the 1990s. These efforts have focused on crisis prevention and crisis management. The prevention of such crises has necessitated the formation of new international groups that include emerging markets in their membership. Measures have also been taken to reduce the vulnerability of countries to such crises. These measures have centered on the need for appropriate macroeconomic policies, including the need for sustainable exchange rate regimes, sound domestic financial systems, and prudent risk management. In the area of crisis management, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has been given access to additional resources for lending to countries that experience financial crises. The IMF has also established new lending facilities for use in such circumstances. It has also been agreed that the private sector will need to play a greater role in the management of such crises in the future. Content Type(s): Publications, Bank of Canada Review articles Research Topic(s): Exchange rate regimes, International topics
Energy Efficiency and Fluctuations in CO2 Emissions Staff Working Paper 2021-47 Soojin Jo, Lilia Karnizova Carbon dioxide emissions have been commonly modelled as rising and falling with total output. Yet many factors, such as energy-efficiency improvements and shifts to cleaner energy, can break this relationship. We evaluate these factors using US data and find that changes in energy efficiency of consumption goods explain a significant proportion of emissions fluctuations. This finding also implies that models that omit energy efficiency likely overestimate the trade-off between environmental protection and economic performance. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Research Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles, Climate change, Econometric and statistical methods JEL Code(s): E, E3, E32, Q, Q4, Q43, Q5, Q50, Q55
Extracting Information from the Business Outlook Survey Using Statistical Approaches Staff Discussion Paper 2012-8 Lise Pichette Since the autumn of 1997, the regional offices of the Bank of Canada have conducted quarterly consultations with businesses across Canada. These consultations, summarized in the Business Outlook Survey (BOS), are structured around a survey questionnaire that covers topics of importance to the Bank, notably business activity, pressures on production capacity, prices and inflation, and credit conditions. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff discussion papers Research Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles, Regional economic developments JEL Code(s): C, C4, C43, C8, C82, E, E3, E37
Optimum Currency Areas and Shock Asymmetry: A Comparison of Europe and the United States Staff Working Paper 1994-1 Nick Chamie, Alain DeSerres, René Lalonde Since the early 1980s, models based on economic fundamentals have been poor at explaining the movements in the exchange rate (Messe 1990). In response to this problem, Frankel and Froot (1988) developed a model that uses two approaches to forecast the exchange rate: the fundamentalist approach, which bases the forecast on economic fundamentals, and the chartist approach, which bases the forecast on the past behaviour of the exchange rate. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Research Topic(s): Exchange rates, Financial markets JEL Code(s): C, C4, C40, G, G1, G12
Model Averaging in Markov-Switching Models: Predicting National Recessions with Regional Data Staff Working Paper 2015-24 Pierre Guérin, Danilo Leiva-Leon This paper introduces new weighting schemes for model averaging when one is interested in combining discrete forecasts from competing Markov-switching models. In particular, we extend two existing classes of combination schemes – Bayesian (static) model averaging and dynamic model averaging – so as to explicitly reflect the objective of forecasting a discrete outcome. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Research Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles, Econometric and statistical methods JEL Code(s): C, C5, C53, E, E3, E32, E37
August 22, 2003 Measuring Interest Rate Expectations in Canada Bank of Canada Review - Summer 2003 Grahame Johnson Financial market expectations regarding future changes in the target for the overnight rate of interest are an important source of information for the Bank of Canada. Financial markets are the mechanism through which the policy rate affects other financial variables, such as longer-term interest rates, the exchange rate, and other asset prices. An accurate measure of their expectations can therefore help policy-makers assess the potential impact of contemplated changes. Johnson focuses on the expectations hypothesis, which measures expectations of future levels of the target overnight rate as implied by current money market yields. Although expectations can be derived from the current yield on any short-term fixed-income asset, some assets have proven to be more accurate predictors than others. The implementation of a policy of fixed-announcements dates has coincided with the increased predictive power of these short-term assets. As a result of this improvement, a relatively simple model of the yield curve can now provide an accurate measure of financial market expectations. Content Type(s): Publications, Bank of Canada Review articles Research Topic(s): Exchange rates, Financial markets, Interest rates
Technology Adoption in Input-Output Networks Staff Working Paper 2019-51 Xintong Han, Lei Xu We study how input-output networks affect the speed of technology adoption. In particular, we model the decision to adopt the programming language Python 3 by software packages. Python 3 provides advanced features but is not backward compatible with Python 2, which implies it comes with adoption costs. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Research Topic(s): Economic models, Firm dynamics, Productivity JEL Code(s): C, C6, C61, L, L2, L23, L8, L86, O, O1, O14, O3, O33
A Consistent Test for Multivariate Conditional Distributions Staff Working Paper 2009-34 Fuchun Li, Greg Tkacz We propose a new test for a multivariate parametric conditional distribution of a vector of variables yt given a conditional vector xt. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Research Topic(s): Econometric and statistical methods JEL Code(s): C, C1, C12, C2, C22
The Propagation of U.S. Shocks to Canada: Understanding the Role of Real-Financial Linkages Staff Working Paper 2010-40 Kimberly Beaton, René Lalonde, Stephen Snudden This paper examines the transmission of U.S. real and financial shocks to Canada and, in particular, the role of financial frictions in affecting the transmission of these shocks. These questions are addressed within the Bank of Canada's Global Economy Model (de Resende et al. forthcoming), a dynamic stochastic general-equilibrium model with an active banking sector and a detailed role for financial frictions. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Research Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles, Economic models, International topics JEL Code(s): E, E2, E21, E27, E3, E32, F, F3, F36, F4, F40