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Deconstructing credibility: The breaking of monetary policy rules in Brazil

Gustavo Cortes and Claudio Paiva

Journal of International Money and Finance, 2017, vol. 74, issue C, 31-52

Abstract: Can political interference deconstruct credibility that was hardly-earned through successful stabilization policy? We analyze the recent switch in the conduct of monetary policy by the Central Bank of Brazil (BCB). Brazil is the largest Emerging Market Economy to formally target inflation, having adopted the Inflation Targeting (IT) regime in 1999. In the early years of IT, the BCB engaged in constructing credibility with price setting agents and succeeded to anchor inflation expectations to its target even under adverse conditions such as exchange rate crises. We argue that this effort to maintain IT rules-based policy ended in 2011, as a new country president and BCB board came to power. We then discuss the consequences of this credibility loss. Our main results can be summarized as follows: (i) we provide strong empirical evidence of the BCB’s shift toward looser, discretionary policy after 2011; (ii) preliminary evidence suggests that this shift has affected agents’ inflation expectations generating social and economic costs.

Keywords: Monetary policy; Inflation targeting; Credibility; Emerging market economies; Brazil (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E50 E52 E58 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (11)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jimfin:v:74:y:2017:i:c:p:31-52

DOI: 10.1016/j.jimonfin.2017.03.004

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