Staff working papers

• Do Sunspots Matter? Evidence from an Experimental Study of Bank Runs

  Staff Working Paper 2014-12 Jasmina Arifovic, Janet Hua Jiang

  A "sunspot" is a variable that has no direct impact on the economy’s fundamental condition, such as preferences, endowments or technologies, but may nonetheless affect economic outcomes through the expectations channel as a coordination device. This paper investigates how people react to sunspots in the context of a bank-run game in a controlled laboratory environment.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Financial markets, Financial stability JEL Code(s): C, C9, C91, C92, D, D8, D80, E, E5, E58, G, G2, G20

• Do High-Frequency Financial Data Help Forecast Oil Prices? The MIDAS Touch at Work

  Staff Working Paper 2014-11 Christiane Baumeister, Pierre Guérin, Lutz Kilian

  The substantial variation in the real price of oil since 2003 has renewed interest in the question of how to forecast monthly and quarterly oil prices. There also has been increased interest in the link between financial markets and oil markets, including the question of whether financial market information helps forecast the real price of oil in physical markets.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Econometric and statistical methods, International topics JEL Code(s): C, C5, C53, G, G1, G14, Q, Q4, Q43

• Macroeconomic Experiences and Risk Taking of Euro Area Households

  Staff Working Paper 2014-10 Miguel Ampudia, Michael Ehrmann

  This paper studies to what extent the experiences of households shape their willingness to take financial risks. It follows the methodology of Malmendier and Nagel (2011) and applies it to a novel data set on household finances covering euro area households.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Sectoral balance sheet JEL Code(s): D, D0, D03, D1, D14, D8, D83, G, G1, G11

• Labor Market Participation, Unemployment and Monetary Policy

  Staff Working Paper 2014-9 Alessia Campolmi, Stefano Gnocchi

  We incorporate a participation decision in a standard New Keynesian model with matching frictions and show that treating the labor force as constant leads to incorrect evaluation of alternative policies.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles, Labour markets, Monetary policy transmission JEL Code(s): E, E2, E24, E3, E32, E5, E52

• Rollover Risk and the Maturity Transformation Function of Banks

  Staff Working Paper 2014-8 Teodora Paligorova, João Santos

  This paper shows that banks that rely heavily on short-term funding engage less in maturity transformation in an attempt to decrease their exposure to rollover risk. These banks shorten both the maturity of their portfolio of loans as well as the maturity of newly issued loans. We find that the loan yield curve becomes steeper with banks’ increasing use of short-term funding.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Financial stability JEL Code(s): G, G2, G21