Financial Innovation, Macroeconomic Volatility and the Great Moderation

doi:10.4236/me.2012.35071

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Modern Economy, 2012, 3, 542-552

http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/me.2012.35071 Published Online September 2012 (http://www.SciRP.org/journal/me)

Financial Innovation, Macroeconomic Volatility and the

Great Moderation

Lorenzo Bencivelli, Andrea Zaghini

Bank of Italy, Research Department—Servizio Studi di Congiuntura e Politica Monetaria, Rome, Italy

Email: [email protected], [email protected]

Received April 23, 2012; revised May 29, 2012; accepted June 7, 2012

ABSTRACT

In the paper we propose an assessment of the role of financial innovation in shaping US macroeconomic dynamics. We

extend an existing model by Christiano, Eichenbaum and Evans which studied the transmission of monetary policy im-

pulses to business and corporate sector financing variables just before the Great Moderation period. By investigating the

properties of the model over a longer time span we show that in the later period a change in the monetary policy trans-

mission mechanism is likely to have occurred. In particular, we argue that the role of financial innovation has signify-

cantly altered the transmission of shocks.

Keywords: Great Moderation; Monetary Policy; Financial Innovation

1. Introduction

The Great Moderation period in the US has been broadly

investigated but it is still a matter of lively discussions.

The stylized facts are very simple and clear: the volatility

and the persistence of many macroeconomic variables

(first of all GDP and inflation) declined significantly s in c e

early 1980s. However, the reasons behind this change in

business cycle dynamics are still unclear. The economic

literature has provided three competing bu t non mutually

excluding hypotheses: the “good luck” hypothesis (the

economy was hit from less severe shocks), the “good pol -

icy” hypothesis (improved monetary policy management),

the “changes in the structure” hypothesis (modifications

in the functioning of the economy which have altered the

transmi ssi o n of monetary an d other kind of shocks).

Recently a new branch of the literature has suggested

that financial innovation may have played and important

role in influencing the business cycle dynamics of the US

economy. In particular, changes in firms’ and consumers’

behaviour, induced by significant financial improvements ,

have allowed private sector agents to better cushion them-

selves from th e impac t of in ter est-rate fluctu ation s. Wi t h in

this new framework, our paper analyses the role played

by net funds raised by the business sector. We build on

an existing model proposed by Christiano, Eichenbaum

and Evans in 1996 by extending their sample in order to

include the whole Great Moderation period. Their model

worked well in identifying monetary policy shocks and

describing the interaction among real and financial vari-

ables over a period which includes only few years of the

Great Moderation era. By adding data till 2006 and by

adequately splitting the sample we show: 1) that the mod el

is not able to describe the dynamics of US economy over

the enlarged period; 2) that the transmission of monetary

policy shocks in an early and a late sub-sample differs

significantly. In particular, the role of financial variables

seems to have changed. Even not including data from the

most recent financial crisis, in the second part of the sa m-

ple financial variab les emerge as the channel through which

the shocks pass to the real sector of the economy.

The paper is structured as follows. Section 2 proposes

a survey of the literature p aying particular attention to the

most recent contributions about the role of financial in-

novation; Section 3 introdu ces th e model by Christiano et

al. [1], Section 4 deals with the estimation results over the

two sub-samples; Section 5 provides a robustness analy-

sis; Section 6 concludes.

2. The Economic Literature

Starting from the late 1990s, a large body of the empiri-

cal literature has examined the Great Moderation era in

the US. A survey of the early contributions can be al-

ready found in Stock and Watson [2]1. More recently,

this lively literature has witnessed a acceleration due to

the employment of new econometric techniques. As al-

ready mentioned, there are three main explanations of the

declined volatility of US macroeconomic times series:

1See Bernanke and Mihov [3], Kim and Nelson [4], McConnel and

Perez-Quiros [5], Clarida et al. [6], Blanchard and Simon [7] among the

earl

studies.

L. BENCIVELLI, A. ZAGHINI 543

the “good luck”, the “good policy” and the “structural

changes” hypotheses.

The “good luck” hypothesis is based on the assumption

that macroeconomic shocks are drawn from a t i m e - v a r y in g

distribution. Over the Great Moderation years the US

economy was simply hit by less severe shocks and in

particular by smaller common international shocks (Stock

and Watson [8]; Si ms and Zha [9]).

The “good policy” explanation of the declined vola-

tile- ity is that the FED ch anged its monetary policy con-

duct improving its ability to tackle exogenous distur-

bances. By systematically responding more decisively to

fluctuations in economic conditions, a credible monetary

policy has since the early 1980s stabilized inflationary

expectations via commitment to a nominal anchor (Lubik

and Schorfheide [10]; Boivin and Giannoni [11]).

Finally, the “structural changes” hypothesis holds that

various innovations induced by technological progress or

financial innovations, might have altered the transmis-

sion mechanism of shocks as well as monetary policy

impulses allowing the private sector to better withstand

the impact of business cycle fluctuations (Giannone et al.

[12]; Galì and Gambetti [13]).

Without the pretence of being exhaustive, we report in

Table 1 a classification of the empirical contributions on

the Great Moderation with respect to the main empirical

method employed and the hypothesis backed by the results.

One of the first and still br oadly used methodology by

empirical works is the sub-sampling. The properties of

the US economy are investigated separately over two dis-

tinct periods. Even if the econometric techniques are of-

ten different (e.g., IRFs are estimated with VAR/FAVAR

or derived from small scale models) the idea is to use the

business cycle dynamics over a pre-Moderation sample

to test the changes of th e Great Moderation period. There

is a relatively large consensus on the break having oc-

curred in 1984. The early sample usually starts in mid-

late 1950s and ends in late 1983 or in any of the four

quarters of 1984. As for the closing date of the Great

Moderation period, the latest available data is commonly

employed. However, at least as inflation dynamics are

concerned, based on a review of econometric estimates

of trend inflation and surveys on inflation expectations,

Mishkin [14] argues that the process of disinflation and

the re-anchoring of long-term inflation expectations was

completed by the end of the 1990s2. Recently more so-

phisticated econometric instruments were employed to

assess the causes of the Great Moderation. In particular

(structural) time-varying coefficient VAR and time vary-

ing regimes modelling are widely used.

As for the motivations of the declined macroeconomic

volatility, from Table 1 we can see that early work s t e n d e d

to support the “good luck” hypothesis while later studies

point to the “good policy explanation” of the Great Mod-

eration. Whereas, apart from the pioneering work of Kim

and Nelson [26], the contribution pointing to a structural

change in the economic framework are the most recent,

regardless of the econometric technique employed.

Among the contributions which suggest that the struc-

tural changes witnessed by the US economy are the main

cause of the Great Moderation, there are several studies

backing the hypothesis that the change in the financial

system is the mo st important one. In particular, this branch

of the literature looks at several possible links between

the working of financial markets and the real economic

activity.

On the on e h and, th e financial accelerator and the pro-

cyclicality of the premia on credit are seen as the main

theoretical tools to assess the process through which the

financial system is supposed to transmit and amplify

economic fluctuations3. On the other hand, financial in-

novation has been proposed as a possible source of mod-

eration of business cycles. Changes in the way financial

market operates have induced structural adjustments in

firms’ and consumers’ behaviour, which in turn let the

private sector better cushioning itself from the impact of

interest-rate fluctuations and macroeconomic shocks. In

particular, the coincidence of the Great Moderation in

macroeconomic variables with an in crease in the volatile-

ity of many financial variables (financial immoderation)

Table 1. Empirical literature.

Good luck Good policy Structural changes

Sub-samples De Blas [16] Clarida et al. [6]

Lubik Schorfheide [10]

Boivin Giannoni [11 ]

Boivin et al. [17]

Canova Gambetti [18]

Gilchrist et al. [19]

Time-varying coefficients Stock Watson [8]

Prim iceri [5]

Justiniano Primiceri [20] Cecchetti et al. [21] Canova Gambetti [22]

Galì Gambetti [13]

Time-varying regimes McConnell Perez [5]

Sims Zha [9]

Korenok Radchenko [23] Kim et al. [24] Galvao Marcellino [25]

Kim Nelson [4]

2For the welfare implication of the declined inflation rate over the Great Moderation period in the US se e Calza and Zaghini [15].

3About the financial accel erator transm ission mechanism see, for instance, Gertler and Lown [26].

L. BENCIVELLI, A. ZAGHINI

544

has pushed the profession looking for possible explana-

tions of the phenomenon. The link proposed goes indeed

through the financial innovation. The underlying intuition

is that transformations occurred in the financial market

(financial innovation) have turned to opportunities for f i rm s

and households to smooth their investment and consump-

tion plans, with the result that economic agents exploited

more the financial instruments (financial immoderation),

but the fluctuations in th e main macroeconomi c aggreg at es

have moderated considerably (macroeconomic modera-

tion). For instance, a change usually suggested by the

literature to support the fin ancial innovation hypothesis is

the democratization of the market (Dynan et al. [27]), i.e.

the agents participation to the market trading without

intervention of institutional intermediaries brought about

by newly developed technologies4.

Of particular interest is the empirical approach fol-

lowed by Jermann and Quadrini [28], Gilchrist et al. [19]

and Fuentes-Albero [29]. They start from the well known

DSGE model for the US economy proposed by Smets

and Wouters [30] and introduce some financial market

frictions to account for spillovers from the financial sys-

tem to the real activity. Following the line of research

pioneered by Kiyotaki and Moore [31] and Bernanke et

al. [32] which show that frictions in the credit market

introduce a transmission mechanism which magnifies

business fluctuations, they try to prove that the process

of convergence toward a better functioning and almost

frictionless financial market can yield more moderate

fluctuations in the real variables, i.e. be the cause of the

Great Moderation5.

According to Gilchrist et al. [21], the in troduction of a

financial accelerator mechanism à la Bernanke et al. [1]

in the Smets and Wouters [34] framework , under the

hypothesis that markets are imperfect, drives a wedge

between expected return on capital and expected return

demanded by the households (the lender). The authors

show that over the period 1973-2008 this mechanism

affects significantly business cycle fluctuations. In par-

ticular, an increase in external finance premium causes

significant and protracted decline in investment spending

and in output. Furthermore, Gilchrist et al. find that the

financial stress is partly responsible for the sharp drop in

output and investments spending in the mid Seventies.

Conversely, the financial easing of the late Nineties pro-

vided a significant impetus to investments.

Looking at Flow-of-Funds data Jermann and Quadrini

[28] document the increase in volatility of firms financial

flows. Specifically, the flows of debt and equity finance-

ing in the business sector displayed much greater vari-

ability from the second half of the 1980s. Because debt

financing is negatively correlated to equity financing, t hes e

findings suggest that firms have become more flexible in

the choice of the financial structure. In their model the

driving forces of business cycles are productivity and c re di t

shocks. The former is the standard productivity shock as

in the typical real business cycle model. The latter is a

shock that affects the enforcement of debt contracts, and

therefore, the borrowing ability of firms (credit shock).

Because of financial frictions, credit shocks are transmit-

ted to the real sector of the economy through the effect

they have on the production and investment decisions of

firms. They show that credit shocks do contribute non-

negligibly to the volatility of the major macroeconomic

variables in the first sample period (1952-1983). In addi-

tion, they find that financial innovations can account for

a large decline in real macroeconomic volatility and they

can easily account for the full increase in the volatility of

the financial structure of firms in the second sample pe-

riod (1984-2006 ).

The paper by Fuentes-Albero [29] tries to reconcile the

two empirical facts of the great moderation of macro-

economic variables and the great immoderation of finan-

cial variables on the path traced by Jermann and Quadrini

[28] and Gilchrist et al. [19]. The goal being that of quan -

tifying the relative role played by financial factors in

shaping macroeconomic volatilities. The baseline model

is again the one by Smets and Wouter [30] enriched with

a financial accelerator mechanism (financial frictions).

Differently from Gilchrist et al. [19] the author allows

for two different financial shocks, one accounting for

the balance sheet channel, the other for the information

channel. The main empirical finding is a redu ction in the

average level of financial rigidities in the second sample

(1984-2006). In particular, the estimated reduction in the

size of the financial accelerator has two effects. On the

one hand, it allows the model to account for 30% of the

slowdown in the volatility o f investment and th e nominal

interest rate. On the other hand, a smaller level of finan-

cial rigidity changes the propagation mechanism of fi-

nancial shocks to the economy.

3. A Benchmark Model

In order to assess whether a change has occurred in the

monetary policy transmission mechanism which is con-

sistent with the Great Moderation timing and, in particu-

lar, if it can be related to some changes in th e way private

sector reacts to unexpected shocks, we build on the 1996

4Other transformations often quoted are the higher efficiency and speed

of the spreading of information; the quick expansion of the market for

high risk debt that has enlarged the participation to the market; the

hasing out of the Regulation Q, which imposed a ceiling on the inter-

est rate on deposits, with the consequence that when market rates were

to rise above this level, funds were no longer available for the lenders,

reducin

the amount of re so urces for borrowers.

5For a different view on the role of the US financial structure see Den

Haan and Sterk [33] who challenge the empirical evidence aboutfi na nc ia l

innovation as a possible explanatory factor of the Great Moderation.

L. BENCIVELLI, A. ZAGHINI 545

work by Christiano, Eichenbaum and Evans (CEE hence-

forth). The CEE paper is a very good starting point for

two reasons: 1) it provides an empirical framework whi ch

worked well in identifying FED monetary policy impulses;

2) it assesses the implication of a monetary policy shock

on business sector variables. In our empirical approach

we mostly focus on the analysis of the impulse response

functions (IRFs) derived from their model over different

periods. We compare the IRFs over different time spans

because there are several behavioural patterns that are

almost unanimously acknowledged to closely describe

the macroeconomic implications of a monetary policy

shock. As put by Christiano et al. [34], every model which

deals with the FED monetary policy ought to reproduce

these well measured and well accepted effects of US

monetary policy shocks. Thus if we find over a given

period that the IRFs describe different patterns with re-

spect to standard behaviours, this would suggest that the

model is no more able to describe the short- to medium-

run dynamics of the US economy. In turn this would

suggest a structural change in the fundamental working

of the US economy or more simply in a different reaction

of the economy to a monetary policy shock.

In the work of 1996, Christiano and co-authors use

two measures of monetary policy shocks (orthogonalized

shock to Fed funds rate and orthogonalized shocks to non-

borrowed reserves) in conjunction with Flow-of-Funds

data to assess the impact of monetary policy on the bor-

rowing and lending activities of different sectors of the

economy. Our first step is to check whether the implica-

tions of the CEE model for the business (and corporate)

sector are still valid over an enlarged sample which in-

cludes the whole Great Moderation period.

The CEE benchmark model is made of six variables

which enter the VAR in the following order over the pe-

riod 1960:Q1-1992:Q4: GDP, GDP deflator, a commodi ty

price index (PCOM), non-borrowed reserves (NBRD),

the Fed Funds rate (FFR), total reserves (TR). When the

Fed Funds rate is specified as the monetary policy in-

strument, the ordering of the variables in the model and

the Cholesky decomposition approach imply that the reac-

tion function of the FED is such that when deciding ab ou t

the optimal interest rate, not o nly the GDP in the curren t

quarter but also the price levels and the commo dity price

index can b e observed.

The first part of the CEE work is entirely devoted to

the assessment of the business cycle properties of the

6-variable VAR. In additio n, the authors verify the v alid-

ity of the model by adding one at time a variable whose

reaction to monetary policy has to be tested. The results

of the empir ical investig ation are in line with the exp e ct ed

textbook macroeconomic behaviours: a contractionary

shock is associated with a decline in GDP, employment,

retail sales, nonfinacial corporate profits and with an in-

crease in unemployment and inventories. The GDP price

deflator declines after two years.

In order to look at different sectors of the economy, in

the second part of their work, the authors, following the

same methodology, add a seventh variable taken from

the FoF accounts to the benchmark VAR. Their main

result is that after a contractionary monetary policy shock

net funds raised by the business sector rise for one year

(2 to 4 quarters). One possible explanation put forward

by the authors is that it is difficult for firms to quickly

alter their nomin al exp end itur es. Und er these circu mst ances ,

if a contractionary monetary policy shock leads to a fall

in firms’ receipts at the beginning of a recession and a

fall in net cash flow, say because of a fall in sales and a

rise in inventories, then we would expect their net de-

mand for funds to rise. According to this scenario, the

observed eventual decline in net funds raised by firms

reflects their ability to gradually reduce their nominal

expenditures.

As a first step of our empirical investigation, we rep li-

cate the CEE model over the original time span (1960-

1992) with the current data availability. Given the sig-

nificant data revisions occurred after the publication of

the paper (especially for the Flow-of-Funds data) it is

worth checking whether the main conclusions are still

valid. We use an increase in the Fed Funds rate as the

contractionary monetary policy shock. Consistently with

the original results, the shock determines a decline in

GDP which reaches the maximum intensity after 7-8 lags,

a decrease in the price index, which becomes significant

after 2 years, a decline in non-borrowed reserves and a

negligible effect at impact on total reserves6.

We also check the response of net funds raised by the

business sector (BNET) and by the corporate sector (CNET)

to a monetary policy shock. They are i n line with t he origin-

nal model: a rise in th e Fed Fund s rate leads to an inc r e a se

in BNET and CNET which is significant for the first 4

quarters. Again the interpretation suggested by Chris-

tiano and co-authors is still valid after the data revision.

The following step is to run the VAR model over the

entire sample 1960-2006. Figure 1 shows that while the

response of non-borrowed reserves and total reserves seems

to unfold in the expected way, it turns out that a contrac-

tionary monetary policy shock has no effect on prices, in

addition the negative reaction of GDP appear to be per-

manent. These two responses clearly suggest that the

model is not able to capture the dynamics of US econ-

omy over the whole period, in turn this is most likely due

to the effect of the Great Moderation. Our point is that

with original data till 1992 the model was still function-

ing reasonably well since just a limited number of years

within the Great Moderation was covered by the sample.

6Impulse response functions available upon request. Note that the

variable for non-

orrowed reserves (NBRD) enters the VAR with a

negative sign. We did so for consistency with CEE variables’ defini-

tion.

L. BENCIVELLI, A. ZAGHINI

546

Figure 3 reports the impulse response functions to a

contractionary monetary policy shock for the early sam-

ple. As expected the dynamics of US economy after an

increase in the Fed Funds rate are well described by the

6-variable VAR proposed by Christiano et al. (1996),

since just few years are left out with respect to the origin-

nal sample. The monetary policy shock determines a

temporary decrease in GDP, a persistent medium-run

decline in prices (even though there is evidence of an

initial price-puzzle) a decline in non-borrowed reserves

and no effect total reserves.

Once the period is enlarged it fails to deliver the same

good results.

In order to check whether a change in the monetary

policy transmission mechanism has occurred (in particu-

lar with reference to the business sector variables), in the

next section we split the sample into an early period,

which ends before the Great Moderation, and a late pe-

riod, which includes the whole Great Moderation era.

4. The Transmission of Shocks over Time

In this section we analyse and compare the IRFs derived

from the CEE model over two sub-samples. In particular,

following the broad consen sus in the empirical literature,

we set the break date and thus the start of the “late pe-

riod” in the first quarter of 1984.

We then look at the effect of the shock in the second

half of the sample which includes the whole Great Mod-

eration period (Figure 4). The striking result is the ab-

sence of a significant response by GDP. Even though the

shock is by far smaller in the second sample than in the

first one (around one third), the rest of the IRFs are in

line with the common knowledge, only GDP dynamics

are indeed puzzling. The monetary policy intervention ha s

notwithstanding achieved the alleged target of a decline

in infl ation. It ju st seems that th e standard Keyn esian ch a n-

nel of monetary policy transmission which goes through

a decline in GDP (via a crowding out of consumption

durables and investment) is completely absent in the mos t

recent period.

The monetary policy shocks obtained from the model

estimated over the whole sample (1960Q1-2006Q4),

the early period (1960Q1-1983Q4) and the late period

(1984Q1-2006Q4) are reported in Figure 2. While the

estimated shocks over the early sample appear to follow

closely the pattern derived from the whole period, those

of the late period show a much smaller size and different

dynamics, especially during recessions. At first sight it

thus seems that the exogenous monetary policy impulses

can not be compared wit hin a unique f ramework.

Figure 1. Monetary policy shock (1960-2006)—CEE model.

L. BENCIVELLI, A. ZAGHINI 547

-3

-2

-1

60-1

62-1

64-1

66-1

68-1

70-1

72-1

74-1

76-1

78-1

80-1

82-1

84-1

86-1

88-1

90-1

92-1

94-1

96-1

98-1

00-1

02-1

04-1

06-1

CEE 1960-2006

Sample 1960-1983

Sample 1984-2006

Figure 2. Monetary policy shock (1960-2006).

Figure 3. IFRs to a monetary policy shock (1960-1983)—CEE model.

A possible suggestion of the reason behind this circu m-

stance can be found by the response of BNET (the net

funds raised by the business sector) to a Fed Funds rate

shocks. In the early period Figure 5 shows that after the

initial increase th e business variable declines significa n tl y,

while this is not true for the later period. This evidence

suggests that a possible “business channel” of the mone-

tary policy transmission that was working in the first part

of the sample is not working in the second. In the early

sample, an increase in the Fed Funds rate had an impact

L. BENCIVELLI, A. ZAGHINI

548

on firms’ financing condition which in turn, together

with other channels, affected GDP dynamics. The effect

is the one documented by Christiano et al. [1]: after a con-

tractionary monetary policy shock net funds raised by

business sector do not immediately decline because it is

difficult for firms to quickly adjust nominal expenditure,

however after few quarters firms are able to reduce their

financing needs by curbing expenditures and thus push-

ing GDP downwards.

In the most recent sample this channel seems to have

disappeared. The finding is consistent with the bran ch of

empirical literature which suggests that financial innova-

tion has induced a structural break able to mitigate busi-

ness cycle fluctuations in a way coherent with the Great

Moderation evidence. Changes in the business sector be-

haviour, induced by the sustained financial innovation of

the last two/three decades, have allowed the private sec-

tor to insulate itself from the impact of interest rate fluc-

tuations.

We also investigate the possibility that a change has

happened in the transmission of the financial shock. Fig-

ure 6 shows in the left hand side panel that in the early

period a shock to the business sector variable has no ef-

fects on real economy: GDP is unchanged, as well as prices.

Also the interest rate does not react, suggesting that finan-

cial variables were not a target of the FED policy. The

scenario changes in the second sub-sample (right hand

side panel). In fact, in the most recent period there is a

negative effect of the financial shock on real GDP, the

reaction being statistically significant and persistent.

The existence of a channel through which a financial

shock hits the real economy is even more relevant given

that we did not include in our sample the latest financial

crisis (one in which the propagation of financial turmoil

to the real economy is commonly agreed to have been

extremely strong). While firms are able to adjust to an

interest rate shock so th at the monetary policy impulse is

not transmitted to the real economy, a shock on the fi-

nancing conditi on has a direct effect on GDP .

5. Model Analysis and Robustness

In this section we propose an analysis of the con tribution

of monetary and financial shock s to the volatilit y of GDP

and prices. In addition we also present a robustness ch eck

of the results of the previous section .

Table 2 shows the contribution of a monetary policy

shock to the volatility of GDP and prices over the two

samples. In the early sample (upper panel), the percentage

of the forecast-error variance attributed to the Fed Funds

shock reaches 20 per cent after 2 years and henceforth is

stable around that share. The value is slightly smaller tha n

Figure 4. IRFs to a monetary policy shock (1984-2006)—CEE model.

L. BENCIVELLI, A. ZAGHINI 549

Figure 5. Effect on BNET of a monetary policy shock—CEE model.

Figure 6. Responses to a financial shock—CEE model.

Table 2. Monetary policy shock contribution to volatility of GDP and pr ic es.

Early sample

4 8 12 16 20 24

11.67 19.43 20.21 19.68 19.38 19.39

GDP

6.53 8.13 9.01 9.52 9.76 9.89

4.88 5.23 10.18 14.77 17.24 17.97

GDPDEF 4.49 5.90 9.12 11.46 12.33 12.53

Late sample

4 8 12 16 20 24

0.15 0.12 0.10 0.12 0.13 0.12

GDP

20.9 3.73 4.63 5.16 5.64 6.02

1.98 9.03 16.87 23.00 26.57 27.89

GDPDEF 3.21 7.71 10.87 12.32 12.73 12.57

the 29 percent after 24 quarters reported by CEE, and in

line with the findings of the empirical literature (Jang and

Ogaki [35]; Uhlig [36]; Canova and Gambetti [22]). When

the model is estimated from 1984 to 2006 (lower panel),

the contribution of the Fed Funds shock however falls to

zero at any horizon, thus confirming that monetary policy

L. BENCIVELLI, A. ZAGHINI

550

has practically no effect on real GDP in the late sample.

Even though stronger in the later sample, the contribution

of the monetary policy shock to prices’ volatility is in-

stead comparable in the two periods.

The evidence is reversed when we look at the percent-

age of the forecast-error variance attributed to the finan-

cial shock (Table 3). The most important contribution is

found in the later sample (lower panel), in which the

share of the volatility attributable to the shock is 10 per

cent after two years and grows to 19 per cent after 24

quarters. There is instead a limited impact on the vola-

tile- ity of prices in both samples.

In order to test the robustness of our results, we em-

ploy a model specification different from that of Chris-

tiano et al. [1] used in Sections 3 and 4. In particular, we

rely on a VAR model which includes the monetary ag-

gregate M2 but not non-borrowed and total reserves. We

thus introduce explicitly a money supply and a money

demand relation in the model7. The ordering of the vari-

ables in the VAR is th e fo llo w ing : GDP, GDP_d ef, PC OM,

FFR, M2.

The IRFs for the sample before the Great Moderation

(1960Q1-1983Q4) and for the sample including the Great

Moderation (1984Q1-2006Q4) show that an exogenous

increase in the Fed Funds rate determines the expected

reaction in all macroeconomic variables, including a de-

cline in M2, only in the early sample. In the late period

GDP seems again to be non affected by the monetary pol -

icy shock8. A persistent reduction in inflation is achiev ed,

but not through a GDP decline.

As in the previous section we then focus on the effects

of a financial shock: the differences in the two periods

are again significant (Figure 7). A financial shock has no

effect on GDP in the early sample (upper panel) whereas

it directly affects GDP in the most recent period (lower

panel). Thus the possibility that financial innovation has

contributed to a change in the transmission of both mo ne-

tary and financial shocks is confirmed also when looking

at a different specification of the US economy.

6. Conclusions

The paper has provided evidence of a change in the reac-

tion of the US macroeconomic variables to monetary and

financial shocks. Our findings are consistent with a broad

literature suggesting that financial innovation is at least

an important contributor to the smoothed business cycle

fluctuations in the Eighties and Nineties, period labeled

as the Great Moderation.

We started from an existing model by Christiano et al.

[1] and we show that their model which was functioning

relatively well over a period up to 1992, is not able to

deliver the same good results over a longer time span

which include all the Great Moderation period. We then

analyse separately the responses to monetary and finan-

cial shocks into two sub-samples: one ending before the

presumed start of the Great Moderation, and one include-

ing the whole Great Moderation era.

Our findings can be summarized as fo llows. First, m o n e -

tary policy impulses have had in the later period a much

weaker effect on GDP dynamics. In particular, a possible

“business channel” of the monetary policy transmission

mechanism that was working in the period before the

Great Moderation has stopped working in the most recent

period. The vigorous financial innovation of the last few

decades has most likely induced a change in the business

sector behaviour, allowing households and firms to insula te

themselves from the impact of interest-rate fluctuations.

Table 3. Financial shock contribution to volatility of GDP and prices.

Early sample

4 8 12 16 20 24

1.57 2.14 1.66 5.87 10.96 11.64

GDP

2.91 3.71 3.36 5.27 6.78 7.03

16.0 7.94 14.47 15.28 9.86 8.97

GDPDEF 2.77 7.55 11.30 11.85 10.06 9.28

Late sample

4 8 12 16 20 24

5.39 10.59 13.45 15.98 17.89 18.95

GDP

5.29 9.18 10.74 11.36 11.59 11.55

0.13 0.17 0.89 1.60 1.74 1.61

GDPDEF 1.94 3.75 5.64 6.52 6.74 6.65

7There is a broad literature supporting the introduction of a monetary aggregate in the VAR identification; see for instance Kim [37], Leeper et al.

[23], Sims and Zha [9], Boivin et al. [17].

8Results not shown but available u pon request.

L. BENCIVELLI, A. ZAGHINI 551

Figure 7. Financial shock (model 2): upper panel 1960-1983, lower panel 1984-2006.

Second, we documented a change also in the transmis-

sion of a financial shock. In the early period the financial

shock was not transmitted to the real side of th e economy,

while it significantly affects GDP dynamics in the later

sample. This evidence is even more relevant given that

our sample ends in 2006 thus not including the financial

turmoil started in the summer 2007 which had severe

spillovers on the real economy.

7. Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank an anonymous referee

and M. Cecioni, G. Grande, S. Neri, R. Sabbatini and F.

Zollino for comments an d helpfu l sugg estions. The v iews

expressed in the paper do not necessarily reflect those of

the Bank of Italy.

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