The Effects of the Federal Reserve Chair’s Testimony on Interest Rates and Stock Prices

Matthew Gordon and Kurt Lunsford

No 23-26, Working Papers from Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland

Abstract: We study how congressional testimony about monetary policy by the Chair of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System affects interest rates and stock prices. First, we study testimony associated with the Federal Reserve’s Monetary Policy Reports (MPRs) to Congress. Testimony for a particular MPR is usually given on two days, one day for each chamber of Congress. We separately study the first day and second day of MPR testimony. We also study testimonies not associated with MPRs but that are still related to monetary policy. We find that first-day MPR testimonies cause the largest movements in interest rates and generate negative co-movement between interest rates and stock prices. Testimonies not associated with MPRs have similar but weaker effects. Second-day MPR testimonies cause the smallest movements in interest rates and generate no co-movement between interest rates and stock prices.

Keywords: Eurodollar future; event study; forward guidance; S&P 500; Treasury note (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E43 E52 E58 G12 G14 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 14
Date: 2023-11-13
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cba, nep-ifn and nep-mon
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Journal Article: The effects of the Federal Reserve Chair’s testimony on interest rates and stock prices (2024)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:fip:fedcwq:97285

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DOI: 10.26509/frbc-wp-202326

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