The Excess Sensitivity of Long-Term Interest Rates: Evidence and Implications for Macroeconomic Models
44 Pages Posted: 9 Mar 2004
Date Written: August 13, 2003
Abstract
This paper demonstrates that long-term forward interest rates in the U.S. often react considerably to surprises in macroeconomic data releases and monetary policy announcements. This behavior is inconsistent with the assumption of many macroeconomic models that the long-run properties of the economy are time-invariant and perfectly known by all economic agents. Under those conditions, the shocks we consider would have only transitory effects on short-term interest rates, and hence would not generate large responses in forward rates. Our empirical findings suggest that private agents adjust their expectations of the long-run inflation rate in response to macroeconomic and monetary policy surprises. Consistent with our hypothesis, forward rates derived from inflation-indexed Treasury debt show little sensitivity to these shocks, indicating that the response of nominal forward rates is mostly driven by inflation compensation. In addition, we find that in the U.K., where the long-run inflation target is known by the private sector, long-term forward rates have not demonstrated excess sensitivity since the Bank of England achieved independence in mid-1997. We present an alternative model in which agents' perceptions of long-run inflation are not completely anchored, which fits all of our empirical results.
Keywords: Long-term interest rates, excess volatility, inflation expectations
JEL Classification: G14, E52
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation
Do you have a job opening that you would like to promote on SSRN?
Recommended Papers
-
Specification Analysis of Affine Term Structure Models
By Qiang Dai and Kenneth J. Singleton
-
Specification Analysis of Affine Term Structure Models
By Qiang Dai and Kenneth J. Singleton
-
By Andrew Ang and Monika Piazzesi
-
By Andrew Ang and Monika Piazzesi
-
By John H. Cochrane and Monika Piazzesi
-
Expectation Puzzles, Time-Varying Risk Premia, and Dynamic Models of the Term Structure
By Qiang Dai and Kenneth J. Singleton
-
Expectation Puzzles, Time-Varying Risk Premia, and Dynamic Models of the Term Structure
By Qiang Dai and Kenneth J. Singleton
-
Expectation Puzzles, Time-Varying Risk Premia, and Dynamic Models of the Term Structure
By Qiang Dai and Kenneth J. Singleton
-
Expectation Puzzles, Time-Varying Risk Premia, and Dynamic Models of the Term Structure
By Qiang Dai and Kenneth J. Singleton
