Federal Reserve's Asset Purchase Research Articles

U.S. Interest Rates and Emerging Market Currencies: Taking Stock 10 Years After the Taper Tantrum

In 2013, a shift in expectations of market participants for the timing of the tapering of the Federal Reserve's asset purchases, and its ramifications for normalization of U.S. monetary policy, led to sharp increases in longer-term U.S. Treasury yields and volatility in broader financial markets. The episode came to be known as the "taper tantrum" because the strong market reaction came in response to Federal Reserve communications that were largely consistent with market analysts' expectations.

What Drives U.S. Treasury Re-use?

We study what drives the re-use of U.S. Treasury securities in the financial system. Using confidential supervisory data, we estimate the degree of collateral re-use at the dealer level through their collateral multiplier : the ratio between a dealer's total secured funding and their outright holdings financed through secured funding. We find that Treasury re-use increases as the supply of available securities decreases, especially when supply declines due to Federal Reserve asset purchases. We also find that non-U.S. dealers' re-use increases when profits from intermediating cash are high, U.S. dealers' re-use increases when demand to source on-the-run Treasuries is high, and both types of dealers' re-use can alleviate safe asset scarcity. Finally, we document a sharp drop in Treasury re-use at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, with a subsequent reversal after the Federal Reserve's intervention to support market functioning.

What Drives U.S. Treasury Re-use?

We study what drives the re-use of U.S. Treasury securities in the financial system. Using confidential supervisory data, we estimate the degree of collateral re-use at the dealer level through their collateral multiplier : the ratio between a dealer's secured funding and their outright holdings. We find that Treasury re-use increases as the supply of available securities decreases, especially when supply declines due to Federal Reserve asset purchases. We also find that non-U.S. dealers' re-use increases when profits from intermediating cash are high, U.S. dealers' re-use increases when demand to source on-the-run Treasuries is high, and both types of dealers' re-use can alleviate safe asset scarcity. Finally, we document a sharp drop in Treasury re-use at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, with a subsequent reversal after the Federal Reserve's intervention to support market functioning.

What Drives U.S. Treasury Re-Use?

We study what drives the re-use of U.S. Treasury securities in the financial system. Using confidential supervisory data, we estimate the degree of collateral re-use at the dealer level through their collateral multiplier: the ratio between a dealer's secured funding and their outright holdings. We find that Treasury re-use increases as the supply of available securities decreases, especially when supply declines due to Federal Reserve asset purchases. We also find that non-U.S. dealers' re-use increases when profits from intermediating cash are high, U.S. dealers' re-use increases when demand to source on-the-run Treasuries is high, and both types of dealers' re-use can alleviate safe asset scarcity. Finally, we document a sharp drop in Treasury re-use at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, with a subsequent reversal after the Federal Reserve's intervention to support market functioning.

Quantitative Easing and Long-Term Yields in Small Open Economies

We compare the effectiveness of Federal Reserve's asset purchase programs in lowering longterm yields with that of similar programs implemented by the Bank of England, the Swedish Riksbank, and the Swiss National Bank's reserve expansion program. We decompose government bond yields into (i) an expectations component, (ii) a global, and (iii) a country specific term premium to analyze two-day changes in 10-year yields around announcement dates. We find that, in contrast to the Federal Reserve's asset purchases, the programs implemented in these smaller economies have not been able to affect the global term premium and, furthermore, they have had limited, but significant, effect in lowering long-term yields.

Analyzing Federal Reserve asset purchases: From whom does the Fed buy?

Asset purchases have become an important monetary policy tool of the Federal Reserve in recent years. To date, most studies of the Federal Reserve’s asset purchases have tried to measure the interest rate effects of the purchases, and several provide evidence that these purchases do have important effects on longer-term market interest rates. The theory of how asset purchases work, however, is less well developed. Some of the empirical studies point to “preferred habitat” models in which investors do not have the same objectives, and therefore prefer to hold different types and maturities of securities. To study this more closely, we exploit Flow of Funds data to assess the types of investors that are selling to the Federal Reserve and their portfolio adjustment after these sales, which could provide a view to the plausibility of preferred habitat models and the transmission of unconventional monetary policy across asset markets. We find that the Federal Reserve is ultimately buying from only a handful of investor types, primarily households (which includes hedge funds), with a different reaction to changes in Federal Reserve holdings of longer-term versus shorter-term assets. Although not evident for all investors, the key participants are shown to rebalance their portfolios toward more risky assets during this period. These results can be interpreted as supporting, at least in part, the preferred habit theory and the view that the monetary policy transmission is working across asset markets.

Analyzing Federal Reserve Asset Purchases: From Whom Does the Fed Buy?

Abstract Asset purchases have become an important monetary policy tool of the Federal Reserve in recent years. To date, most studies of the Federal Reserve’s asset purchases have tried to measure the interest rate effects of the purchases, and several provide evidence that these purchases do have important effects on longer-term market interest rates. The theory of how asset purchases work, however, is less well developed. Some of the empirical studies point to “preferred habitat” models in which investors do not have the same objectives, and therefore prefer to hold different types and maturities of securities. To study this more closely, we exploit Flow of Funds data to assess the types of investors that are selling to the Federal Reserve and their portfolio adjustment after these sales, which could provide a view to the plausibility of preferred habitat models and the transmission of unconventional monetary policy across asset markets. We find that the Federal Reserve is ultimately buying from only a handful of investor types, primarily households (which includes hedge funds), with a different reaction to changes in Federal Reserve holdings of longer-term versus shorter-term assets. Although not evident for all investors, the key participants are shown to rebalance their portfolios toward more risky assets during this period. These results can be interpreted as supporting, at least in part, the preferred habit theory and the view that the monetary policy transmission is working across asset markets.

A Portfolio-Balance Approach to the Nominal Term Structure

I examine how the maturity structure of outstanding government li- abilities aects the nominal yield curve under a variety of assumptions about investor objectives. In the class of models I consider, equilib- ria are arbitrage free, expectations are rational, and assets are valued only for their pecuniary returns. Nonetheless, a portfolio-balance mech- anism arises through the dependence of the pricing kernel on the return on wealth. This mechanism results in a positive relationship between the duration of bondholders'portfolios and the price of interest-rate risk. Quantitatively, the models suggest that the eects of shifting Treasury supply on yields can be substantial— for example, the increase in the av- erage maturity of U.S. government debt that occurred between 1976 and 1988 may have raised the ten-year yield by 50 basis points. On the other hand, partly re‡ecting an attenuation of portfolio-balance eects when in- terest rates are near zero, the Federal Reserve's asset purchase programs likely had a fairly small impact on the yield curve by removing duration from the market.

Analyzing Federal Reserve Asset Purchases: From Whom does the Fed Buy?

Asset purchases have become an important monetary policy tool of the Federal Reserve in recent years. To date, most studies of the Federal Reserve's asset purchases have tried to measure the interest rate effects of the policies. Several papers provide evidence that these programs do have important effects on longer-term market interest rates. The theory of how asset purchases work, however, is less well developed. Some of the empirical studies point to 'preferred habitat' models in which investors do not have the same objectives, and therefore prefer to hold different types and maturities of securities. We exploit Flow of Funds data to assess the types of investors that are selling to the Federal Reserve and their portfolio adjustment after these sales, which could provide a view to the plausibility of preferred habitat models and the transmission of unconventional monetary policy across asset markets. We find that the Federal Reserve is ultimately buying from only a handful of investor types, primarily households, with a different reaction to changes in Federal Reserve holdings of longer-term versus shorter-term assets. Although not evident for all investors, the key participants are shown to rebalance their portfolios toward more risky assets during this period. These results can be interpreted as supporting, at least in part, the preferred habit theory and the view that the monetary policy transmission is working across asset markets.

Duration Risk versus Local Supply Channel in Treasury Yields: Evidence from the Federal Reserve's Asset Purchase Announcements

The FOMC's announcements of Treasury purchase programs and the subsequent or contemporaneous statements by the New York Fed about the programs' operational details provide a sequence of natural experiments with the potential to shed light on the relative importance of the duration risk channel versus the local supply channel for the transmission of supply effects to the term structure of interest rates. Using intraday security-level data on Treasury securities, we conduct five event studies to document the presence of local supply effects and duration risk effects. Further, using our new measures of local supply surprise and duration risk surprise we quantify the average impact of these two supply channels on nominal Treasury yields for each of the five events. Finally, we also try to determine how the importance of these factors has changed over time and relative to the first Large Scale Asset Purchase program in 2008-09. We find that: first, once the pre-announcement market expectations are carefully controlled for, the duration risk and local supply channels together are responsible for a decline in yields averaging about 9 basis points per $100 billion over the course of these announcements second, these two channels are almost equally important for the transmission mechanism of purchases, as on average each of these channels accounts for about half of the yields decline third, the efficacy of these two channels does not seem to have declined over time and fourth, the purchase and sale price reactions to the announcements are quite similar, a result potentially relevant for the unwinding of these programs.

The Federal Reserve's Balance Sheet and Earnings: A Primer and Projections

Over the past few years, the Federal Reserve's use of unconventional monetary policy tools has led it to hold a large portfolio of securities. The asset purchases are intended to put downward pressure on longer-term interest rates, but also affect the Federal Reserve's balance sheet and income. We present a framework for projecting Federal Reserve assets and liabilities and income through time. The projections are based on public economic forecasts and announced Federal Open Market Committee policy principles. The projections imply that for the next several years, the Federal Reserve's balance sheet remains large by historical standards, and earnings remain high. Using the FOMC's stated exit strategy principles and the Blue Chip financial forecasts of the federal funds rate, the projections have the Federal Reserve's portfolio beginning to contract in 2015, returning to a more normal size in 2018 or 2019, and returning to a more normal composition a year thereafter. The projections imply that Federal Reserve remittances to the Treasury may decline for a time, and in some cases fall to zero. Once the portfolio is normalized, earnings are projected to return to their long-run trend. On net over the entire period of unconventional monetary policy actions, cumulative earnings are higher than what they might have been without the Federal Reserve asset purchase programs. To illustrate the interest rate sensitivity of the portfolio, we consider scenarios where interest rates are 100 basis points higher or lower than in the baseline. With higher interest rates, earnings tend to fall a bit more and remittances to the Treasury stop for a longer period than in our baseline projections, while with lower interest rates earnings are a bit larger and remittances continue throughout the projection period.

Expectations About the Federal Reserve's Balance Sheet and the Term Structure of Interest Rates

This paper provides a systematic assessment of the effect of the Federal Reserve's asset purchase programs on Treasury yields, with particular emphasis on the role of market expectations about the evolution of the Federal Reserve's balance sheet and of interest rates on the impact of the programs. We construct measures of such market expectations based on Blue Chip survey forecasts, Congressional Budget Office projections, and information from formal FOMC communications. Those measures are combined with a no-arbitrage term structure model, in which yields are driven by current and expected future private Treasury holdings, among other factors. This approach allows us to provide estimates of the term premium effects of the asset programs both at the time of the announcements and in the future as expectations about the economy and the Federal Reserve's balance sheet evolve. Our results suggest that the program with the largest initial impact on the ten year Treasury yield was the first purchase program, which is estimated to have held down rates by about 40 basis points in early 2009, and the initial maturity extension program had the second largest estimated impact at its inception, pushing rates down by about 20 basis points in late 2011. Currently, we estimate all programs combined are holding down the 10-year yield by about 65 basis points, of which about one-third is attributable to the first purchase program.

Have We Underestimated the Likelihood and Severity of Zero Lower Bound Events?

Prior to the financial crisis, most economists probably did not view the zero lower bound (ZLB) as a major problem for central banks. Using a range of structural and statistical models, we find that previous research understated the ZLB threat by ignoring uncertainty about model parameters and latent variables, focusing too much on the Great Moderation experience, and relying on structural models whose dynamics cannot generate sustained ZLB episodes. Our analysis also suggests that the Federal Reserve's asset purchases, while materially improving macroeconomic conditions, did not prevent the ZLB constraint from having first‐order adverse effects on real activity and inflation.

The Economy Today and a Policy Framework for Today and Tomorrow

The U.S. economy appears to be on track for a sustainable recovery, dominated by private demand, with major components of growth other than residential construction likely to grow at a healthy rate through 2011. Inflation is likely to remain in an acceptable zone, but policymakers must be vigilant concerning inflation expectations. Employment is expected to recover slowly. Within this broad outlook, uncertainty appears to be growing, particularly with the unrest in the Middle East and North Africa. This uncertainty implies that flexibility is essential in either extending Federal Reserve asset purchases or in exiting from its current position. Given that passive unwinding of this position will probably not be feasible and that monetary policy acts with lags, it is important to employ a forward-looking rule to guide action.

Have We Underestimated the Likelihood and Severity of Zero Lower Bound Events?

Before the recent recession, the consensus among researchers was that the zero lower bound (ZLB) probably would not pose a significant problem for monetary policy as long as a central bank aimed for an inflation rate of about 2 percent; some have even argued that an appreciably lower target inflation rate would pose no problems. This paper reexamines this consensus in the wake of the financial crisis, which has seen policy rates at their effective lower bound for more than two years in the United States and Japan and near zero in many other countries. We conduct our analysis using a set of structural and time series statistical models. We find that the decline in economic activity and interest rates in the United States has generally been well outside forecast confidence bands of many empirical macroeconomic models. In contrast, the decline in inflation has been less surprising. We identify a number of factors that help to account for the degree to which models were surprised by recent events. First, uncertainty about model parameters and latent variables, which were typically ignored in past research, significantly increases the probability of hitting the ZLB. Second, models that are based primarily on the Great Moderation period severely understate the incidence and severity of ZLB events. Third, the propagation mechanisms and shocks embedded in standard DSGE models appear to be insufficient to generate sustained periods of policy being stuck at the ZLB, such as we now observe. We conclude that past estimates of the incidence and effects of the ZLB were too low and suggest a need for a general reexamination of the empirical adequacy of standard models. In addition to this statistical analysis, we show that the ZLB probably had a first-order impact on macroeconomic outcomes in the United States. Finally, we analyze the use of asset purchases as an alternative monetary policy tool when short-term interest rates are constrained by the ZLB, and find that the Federal Reserve's asset purchases have been effective at mitigating the economic costs of the ZLB. In particular, model simulations indicate that the past and projected expansion of the Federal Reserve's securities holdings since late 2008 will lower the unemployment rate, relative to what it would have been absent the purchases, by 1-1/2 percentage points by 2012. In addition, we find that the asset purchases have probably prevented the U.S. economy from falling into deflation.

The Federal Reserve's Mandate: Long Run

Given the slow recovery of the U.S. economy, quantitative easing of monetary policy in the form of U.S. Federal Reserve asset purchases has been attractive. However, it is not clear that the current and likely future economic environment warrants this policy, given its long-term risks. This paper outlines these risks and makes the case for a return to conventional policy by allowing currently held assets to roll off the Federal Reserve's balance sheet as they reach maturity and by resuming more conventional monetary policy. This is not a quick fix, but it is less risky than current policy in achieving the Federal Reserve's long-run dual mandate of price stability and maximum employment.