Working Paper Series no. 183: Euro Area Market Reactions to the Monetary Developments Press Release

Abstract

Using intra-day data, we assess the impact of the press release on euro area monetary data on the different segments of the euro area yield curve. For this purpose, we estimate a relation between the "news" or "surprise" in the released data for annual M3 growth and the move in the interest rates for a time-window surrounding the press release. We find that the publication of monetary data has a statistically significant impact on interest rates with maturities ranging from 1 to 10 years, with the largest effect on the 1-2 year segment. Turning to the short end of the yield curve, since mid-2001 rates with maturities up to 6 months do not react much to the monetary developments press release. Our results suggest that market participants may look through short-term movements of annual M3 growth and focus instead on the trend rate of monetary expansion over the medium term when gauging the policy relevant signals.

Jérôme Coffinet and Sylvain Gouteron
September 2007

Classification JEL : E43, E44, E52, E58.

Keywords : High-frequency data, macroeconomic announcements, money growth.