Tag Archives: Central Bank

CEPR Discussion Paper 13065, July 2018. PDF. (Personal copy.) I offer a macroeconomic perspective on the “Reserves for All” (RFA) proposal to let the general public use electronic central bank money. After distinguishing RFA from cryptocurrencies and relating the proposal to discussions about narrow banking and the abolition of cash I propose an equivalence result according to which a marginal substitution of outside for inside money does not affect macroeconomic outcomes. I identify key...

Radio Bern RaBe, May 15, 2018. HTML with link to podcast (interview starts at 08:15). Interview with Radio Bern RaBe about Vollgeld and the Vollgeld initiative.

According to René Scheu in the NZZ. Die zehn «Massregeln» für die «fortgeschrittensten Länder», in die das «Kommunistische Manifest» mündet, lesen sich aus heutiger Sicht wie ein sozialdemokratisches Programm, dem auch viele softbürgerliche Politiker sogleich vorbehaltlos zustimmen würden. Starke Progressivsteuer, Geldmonopol der Nationalbank, Zentralisation des Transportwesens, nationale Industriepolitik, Verstaatlichung des Bauernstandes und unentgeltliche Erziehung aller Kinder gehören...

[embedded content] Wer soll Franken herstellen dürfen? Nur die Schweizerische Nationalbank, oder auch die Geschäftsbanken wie UBS, CS oder die Kantonalbanken? Ginge es nach der Vollgeld-Initiative, über die wir am 10. Juni abstimmen, wäre künftig klar: Geld als gesetzliches Zahlungsmittel gäbe es nur von der SNB. Offsetmaschine zum Druck von Schweizer Banknoten bei der Schweizerischen Nationalbank. Keystone - Click to...

SRF, April 28, 2018. HTML with link to audio file (interview starts at 13:15). Interview with Swiss public radio about Vollgeld and the Vollgeld initiative.

On their blog, Stephen Cecchetti and Kermit Schoenholtz voice doubts regarding the usefulness of universal central bank digital currency (U-CBDC). They argue: … in an effort to retain their deposit base, commercial banks would surely raise the interest rate they offer to their customers relative to the rate on U-CBDC. … the introduction of U-CBDC would cause a substantial fraction of deposits to shift to the central bank, with the remainder prone to exit in a period of financial stress. …...

Central bankers often argue that CBDC would increase the risk of bank runs. On his blog, JP Koning rejects this notion. After all, he retorts, during a confidence crisis bank customers would no longer have to queue to withdraw cash; lender of last resort support would be provided much more quickly; and “large” cash holders would continue to shift funds into treasury bills, not into CBDC. Koning writes: The general criticism here is that during a crisis, households and businesses will...

The Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control has published a special issue with the papers of the conference on “Fiscal and Monetary Policies” that the Study Center Gerzensee co-organized with the JEDC, the St. Louis Fed, the University of Bern, and the Swiss National Bank. This earlier post contains a link to the conference program.

In the most ironic story of the day, the company that makes the paper that Swiss banknotes are printed on was just bailed out by the money-printing, stock-purchasing, plunge-protecting, savior-of-global equities…Swiss National Bank. - Click to enlarge While The SNB has a long and checkered history of buying shares in companies… as we have detailed numerous times, it is no stranger to pumping money into companies...

It looks like BoJ Governor, Haruhiko Kuroda’s, minions are getting out and about to brief the financial news services that the biggest stimulator of all the central banks might reduce stimulus earlier than expected. The recipient of the unofficial briefings by BoJ officials is Reuters, which has this to say. The Bank of Japan is dropping subtle, yet intentional, hints that it could edge away from crisis-mode stimulus earlier than expected, through a future hike in its yield target,...