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No. wp2024-2   (Download at EconPapers)
Natalia Levenko
Monetary policy transmission in different credit markets
The paper examines the intermediate stage of monetary policy transmission by analysing how credit growth responds to interest rate changes. It studies the markets for mortgages, consumer credit, and corporate loans separately, and pays special attention to periods when the short-term interest rate was very low. It uses quarterly country-level data from 2005Q1 to 2022Q4 for 15 euro area countries and applies standard panel-data estimation techniques. The results indicate that credit markets respond to changes in monetary policy in the expected way. While the magnitude of the reaction varies across credit markets, there are no discernible differences between the reactions of different subgroups in the sample. The hypothesis that monetary policy might be less effective when interest rates are very low is not supported by the empirical evidence. Rather the opposite, the paper finds that when Euribor is very low, credit markets become more responsive to changes in interest rates. This holds true primarily in the market for corporate loans and to some extent in the market for mortgages.
JEL-Codes: E44, E51, E52
Keywords: monetary policy transmission, interest rate channel, bank lending channel, credit growth, housing loans, corporate loans, consumer credit
No. wp2024-1   (Download at EconPapers)
Konstantins Benkovskis, Jaanika Meriküll and Aurelija Proškute
The transmission of trade shocks across countries: firm-level evidence from the Covid-19 crisis
This paper studies the margins and heterogeneity of adjustments to trade shocks by estimating how Covid-19 restrictions affected imports and exports. We use data from Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia on foreign trade at the level of the firm and the partner country and at monthly frequency from January 2019 to December 2020. The focus is on the short-term adjustment and on the first wave of the pandemic. We find that the adjustment to the restrictions mostly occurs through the intensive margin, meaning trade values are reduced rather than trade in certain markets or products ceasing. It is further observed that quantity played a more important role in the adjustment process than prices and that both upstream and downstream restrictions played an equally important role in the decline of foreign trade. It is shown that differentiated products that are difficult to replace are responsible for this adjustment pattern.
JEL-Codes: F14, F61, D22
Keywords: transmission of shocks, input-output linkages, global value chains, Covid-19, workplace closing
No. wp2023-7   (Download at EconPapers)
Merike Kukk, Jan Toczynski and Christopher Basten
Beyond the Headline: How Personal Exposure to Inflation Shapes the Financial Choices of Households
Using individual level panel data from a period of volatile inflation in Estonia in 2005-11 and interactive fixed effect estimation, we find individual consumption to respond to personal inflation beyond the headline rate. Households are exposed to different inflation due to different consumption baskets. For each percentage point of higher personal inflation exposure, they increase consumption by more than 1%, and also increase stock market investments. These responses are consistent with backwardlooking inflation expectations. They are financed with savings or borrowing, except when the household is liquidity-constrained or over-indebted. Extra demand when inflation is already high can make inflation persistent and dependent on its current distribution
JEL-Codes: D14, D15, E21, E31
Keywords: inflation heterogeneity, personal inflation exposure, consumption, borrowing, interactive fixed effects, intertemporal choices
No. wp2023-6   (Download at EconPapers)
Dmitry Kulikov and Nicolas Reigl
The natural rate of unemployment in Estonia: empirical determinants and a new semi-structural model
This paper addresses the empirical modelling of the natural rate of unemployment in Estonia. It has two interlinked parts. The first part considers potential empirical determinants of the natural rate of unemployment in a sample of 31 OECD countries, and the second incorporates many of those determinants into a new quarterly semi-structural model of the natural rate of unemployment for Estonia, which we estimate over the period 1998–2019. Our methodological approach to building this new semi-structural model is to explore a space of 4  212 alternative model specifications, each one featuring a distinct combination of extrinsic determinants of the natural rate, and measures of the rate of unemployment and the state of the labour market in Estonia. We find that although some of these potential determinants enter our model in a statistically significant way, the overall time dynamics of the estimated natural rate of unemployment for Estonia are not much affected by these factors, and our estimates of the natural rate are quite similar across all of these determinants over the full sample period. However, we also find that our estimates of the natural rate of unemployment are quite sensitive to the choice of measures of the state of the labour market and the rate of unemployment used in estimating the new model
JEL-Codes: E32, E58, C32, C52
Keywords: natural rate of unemployment, unemployment gap, NAIRU, panel data, semistructural modelling, model averaging
No. wp2023-5   (Download at EconPapers)
Eva Branten
Income expectations, risk attitudes and household borrowing decisions
This paper studies whether positive expectations for real income and risk aversion can provide information beyond that given by the main economic and sociodemographic characteristics for predicting whether a household applied for a loan or increased its outstanding liabilities. Microdata from the Eurosystem Household Finance and Consumption Survey (HFCS) are employed in the study, which covers a subgroup of the countries conducting the survey that have a panel component. The main estimation method used is a set of panel data fixed effects models. The estimation results imply that positive expectations for real income matter for increases in mortgage loans, but not for non-mortgage loans. Risk aversion is negatively related with the probability of applying for a loan but has no significant effect on an increase in debt
JEL-Codes: G51, D14
Keywords: household borrowing, financial expectations, risk attitudes, Eurosystem Household Finance and Consumption Survey
No. wp2023-07   (Download at EconPapers)
Merike Kukk and Jan Toczynski
Beyond the Headline: How Personal Exposure to Inflation Shapes the Financial Choices of Households
Using individual level panel data from a period of volatile inflation in Estonia in 2005-11 and interactive fixed effect estimation, we find individual consumption to respond to personal inflation beyond the headline rate. Households are exposed to different inflation due to different consumption baskets. For each percentage point of higher personal inflation exposure, they increase consumption by more than 1%, and also increase stock market investments. These responses are consistent with backwardlooking inflation expectations. They are financed with savings or borrowing, except when the household is liquidity-constrained or over-indebted. Extra demand when inflation is already high can make inflation persistent and dependent on its current distribution
JEL-Codes: D14, D15, E21, E31
Keywords: inflation heterogeneity, personal inflation exposure, consumption, borrowing, interactive fixed effects, intertemporal choices
No. wp2023-06   (Download at EconPapers)
Dmitry Kulikov and Nicolas Reigl
The natural rate of unemployment in Estonia: empirical determinants and a new semi-structural model
This paper addresses the empirical modelling of the natural rate of unemployment in Estonia. It has two interlinked parts. The first part considers potential empirical determinants of the natural rate of unemployment in a sample of 31 OECD countries, and the second incorporates many of those determinants into a new quarterly semi-structural model of the natural rate of unemployment for Estonia, which we estimate over the period 1998–2019. Our methodological approach to building this new semi-structural model is to explore a space of 4  212 alternative model specifications, each one featuring a distinct combination of extrinsic determinants of the natural rate, and measures of the rate of unemployment and the state of the labour market in Estonia. We find that although some of these potential determinants enter our model in a statistically significant way, the overall time dynamics of the estimated natural rate of unemployment for Estonia are not much affected by these factors, and our estimates of the natural rate are quite similar across all of these determinants over the full sample period. However, we also find that our estimates of the natural rate of unemployment are quite sensitive to the choice of measures of the state of the labour market and the rate of unemployment used in estimating the new model.
JEL-Codes: E32, E58, C32, C52
Keywords: natural rate of unemployment, unemployment gap, NAIRU, panel data, semistructural modelling, model averagin