[go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/imf/imfwpa/2008-037.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Issues in Central Bank Finance and Independence

Author

Listed:
  • Åke Lönnberg
  • Mr. Peter Stella
Abstract
Conventional economic policy models focus only on selected elements of the central bank balance sheet, in particular monetary liabilities and sometimes foreign reserves. The canonical model of an "independent" central bank assumes that it chooses money (or an interest rate), unconstrained by a need to generate seignorage for itself or government. While a long line of literature has emphasized the dangers of fiscal dominance influencing the conduct of monetary policy the idea that an independent central bank could be constrained in achieving its policy objectives by its own balance sheet situation is a relatively novel idea considered in this paper. If one accepts this potential constraint as a valid concern, the financial strength of the central bank as a stand alone entity becomes highly relevant for ascertaining monetary policy credibility. We consider several strands of evidence that clearly indicate fiscal backing for central banks cannot be assumed and hence financial independence is relevant to operational independence. First we examine 135 central bank laws to illustrate the variety of legal approaches adopted with respect to central bank financial independence. Second, we examine the same data set with regard to central bank recapitalization provisions to show that even in cases where the treasury is nominally responsible for maintaining the central bank financially strong, it may do so in purely a cosmetic fashion. Third, we show that, in actual practice, treasuries have frequently not provided central banks with genuine financial support on a timely basis leaving them excessively reliant on seignorage to finance their operations and/or forcing them to abandon policy objectives.

Suggested Citation

  • Åke Lönnberg & Mr. Peter Stella, 2008. "Issues in Central Bank Finance and Independence," IMF Working Papers 2008/037, International Monetary Fund.
    • Handle: RePEc:imf:imfwpa:2008/037
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/cat/longres.aspx?sk=21689
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mr. Alain Ize, 2005. "Capitalizing Central Banks: A Net Worth Approach," IMF Working Papers 2005/015, International Monetary Fund.
    2. Olivier Jeanne & Lars E. O. Svensson, 2007. "Credible Commitment to Optimal Escape from a Liquidity Trap: The Role of the Balance Sheet of an Independent Central Bank," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(1), pages 474-490, March.
    3. Alfred Broaddus & Marvin Goodfriend, 1996. "Foreign exchange operations and the Federal Reserve," Economic Quarterly, Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, issue Win, pages 1-20.
    4. Mr. George A Mackenzie & Mr. Peter Stella, 1996. "Quasi-Fiscal Operations of Public Financial Institutions," IMF Occasional Papers 1996/008, International Monetary Fund.
    5. Luis Jácome & Eric Parrado, 2006. "The Quest for Price Stability in Central America and the Dominican Republic," Working Papers Central Bank of Chile 390, Central Bank of Chile.
    6. repec:bla:intfin:v:2:y:1999:i:3:p:339-60 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. C.A.E. Goodhart, 1999. "Myths about the Lender of Last Resort," International Finance, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 2(3), pages 339-360, November.
    8. Jean Tirole, 2006. "The Theory of Corporate Finance," Post-Print hal-00173191, HAL.
    9. Mr. Peter Stella, 1997. "Do Central Banks Need Capital?," IMF Working Papers 1997/083, International Monetary Fund.
    10. Mr. Alain Ize, 2006. "Spending Seigniorage: Do Central Banks Have a Governance Problem?," IMF Working Papers 2006/058, International Monetary Fund.
    11. Alain Ize, 2005. "Capitalizing Central Banks: A Net Worth Approach," IMF Staff Papers, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 52(2), pages 289-310, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ake Lonnberg & Peter Stella, 2008. "Issues in central bank finance and independence," FRB Atlanta Working Paper 2008-13, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
    2. Jakob Korbinian Eberl, 2016. "The Collateral Framework of the Eurosystem and Its Fiscal Implications," ifo Beiträge zur Wirtschaftsforschung, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 69.
    3. Jorge E. Restrepo L. & Luis Salomó S. & Rodrigo O. Valdés P., 2009. "Macroeconomy, Monetary Policy and Central Bank Capitalization," Journal Economía Chilena (The Chilean Economy), Central Bank of Chile, vol. 12(1), pages 5-38, April.
    4. Martin Cincibuch & Tomáš Holub & Jaromír Hurník, 2009. "Central Bank Losses and Economic Convergence," Czech Journal of Economics and Finance (Finance a uver), Charles University Prague, Faculty of Social Sciences, vol. 59(3), pages 190-215, August.
    5. Schobert, Franziska, 2006. "Linking financial soundness and independence of central banks--Central and Eastern Europe, Turkey and CIS countries," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 20(2), pages 239-255, June.
    6. Mr. Andrew J Swiston & Ms. Florencia Frantischek & Mr. Przemek Gajdeczka & Alexander Herman, 2014. "Central Bank Financial Strength in Central America and the Dominican Republic," IMF Working Papers 2014/087, International Monetary Fund.
    7. Gustavo Adler & Pedro Castro & Camilo Tovar, 2016. "Does Central Bank Capital Matter for Monetary Policy?," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 27(1), pages 183-205, February.
    8. Julien Pinter, 2018. "Does Central Bank Financial Strength Really Matter for Inflation? The Key Role of the Fiscal Support," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 29(5), pages 911-952, November.
    9. repec:cii:cepiei:2010-4ta is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Mr. Peter Stella & Mr. Ulrich H Klueh, 2008. "Central Bank Financial Strength and Policy Performance: An Econometric Evaluation," IMF Working Papers 2008/176, International Monetary Fund.
    11. Zbigniew Polański & Mikołaj Szadkowski, 2021. "An accounting-based model of seigniorage, and recent monetary developments," Bank i Kredyt, Narodowy Bank Polski, vol. 52(5), pages 391-436.
    12. Stephen Quinn & William Roberds, 2016. "Death of a Reserve Currency," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 12(4), pages 63-103, December.
    13. Mr. Alain Ize, 2006. "Spending Seigniorage: Do Central Banks Have a Governance Problem?," IMF Working Papers 2006/058, International Monetary Fund.
    14. Schwarz Claudia & Karakitsos Polychronis & Merriman Niall & Studener Werner, 2015. "Why Accounting Matters: A Central Bank Perspective," Accounting, Economics, and Law: A Convivium, De Gruyter, vol. 5(1), pages 1-42, March.
    15. Mirkov, Nikola & Pozdeev, Igor & Söderlind, Paul, 2019. "Verbal interventions and exchange rate policies: The case of Swiss franc cap," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 42-54.
    16. Dirk Broeders & Paul Wessels, 2022. "On the capitalisation of central banks," Occasional Studies 2004, DNB.
    17. Perera, Anil & Ralston, Deborah & Wickramanayake, Jayasinghe, 2013. "Central bank financial strength and inflation: Is there a robust link?," Journal of Financial Stability, Elsevier, vol. 9(3), pages 399-414.
    18. Osama Sweidan, 2010. "Central bank inability and Taylor rule in developing countries," International Review of Economics, Springer;Happiness Economics and Interpersonal Relations (HEIRS), vol. 57(4), pages 395-409, December.
    19. Mr. Bernard J Laurens & Mr. Marco Arnone & Jean-François Segalotto, 2006. "The Measurement of Central Bank Autonomy: Survey of Models, Indicators, and Empirical Evidence," IMF Working Papers 2006/227, International Monetary Fund.
    20. Lixin Sun, 2020. "On the People’s Bank of China’s Financial Strength and Policy Outcomes," Journal of Central Banking Theory and Practice, Central bank of Montenegro, vol. 9(3), pages 135-161.
    21. Atsushi Tanaka, 2013. "Central Bank Financial Strength and Credibility: A Simple Dynamic Optimization Model," Discussion Paper Series 102, School of Economics, Kwansei Gakuin University, revised Mar 2013.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:imf:imfwpa:2008/037. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Akshay Modi (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/imfffus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.