Comparing the Fed, the ECB, and the BoE Before Policies Diverge
This week is G4 central bank week. The Federal Reserve Bank (Fed) announces its policy decision on November 3; the European Central Bank (ECB) and the Bank of England (BoE) will make policy announcements on November 4; and the Bank of Japan pushed forward its November 15-16 meeting to be held now on November 4-5.
At this juncture, G4 ex Japan monetary policy is likely to diverge sharply: the Fed is expected to announce an extension of its asset purchase program, while the ECB and BoE are not expected to increase theirs. In fact, the policy wedge between the three central banks is already wide. Despite the ECB’s enacting its covered bond purchase program, the amount is small, roughly 1.4% of Eurozone GDP (see chart below), and the central bank is sterilizing the flow – sterilizing the operation means that the ECB performs equal and opposite monetary operations to reduce bank reserves by the amount of the bond purchase program.
The chart above illustrates the size of the bond purchase programs (assets sitting on the central bank balance sheet) as a share of 2010 GDP (IMF forecast). Ostensibly, and from a bank-lending point of view, Eurozone financial conditions appear to be “healthier” than those in the UK or US.
The chart above illustrates total bank lending in the Eurozone, UK, and the US; but this may change as austerity measures in some European countries infect the stronger economies via a tightly integrated trade relationship.
Policy is already much tighter in the ECB compared to its US and UK counterparts. This discrepancy is expected to diverge, as the Fed moves into QE2 mode this week.
This commentary is crossposted with Angry Bear blog.
Originally published at News N Economics and reproduced here with permission.
5 Responses to “Comparing the Fed, the ECB, and the BoE Before Policies Diverge”
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