Résultat de la recherche
Private money and money market integration: the role of payments infrastructure in 19th century Switzerland
Using newly collected discount rate data for six Swiss cities, we find no evidence of increasing integration during a 30-year period of lightly regulated free banking. We attribute this to two structural issues: banks had incentives to protect their local monopolies, and the inherent instability of free banking meant that there was always a risk (which varied across banks) of a bank run. We use a novel counterfactual to show that these risks increased discount rate dispersion, and argue that as a result, public regulation of payments infrastructure was necessary for money market integration.
A daily fever curve for the Swiss economy
Because macroeconomic data is published with a substantial delay, assessing the health of the economy during the rapidly evolving COVID-19 crisis is challenging. We develop a fever curve for the Swiss economy using publicly available daily financial market and news data. The indicator can be computed with a delay of 1 day. Moreover, it is highly correlated with macroeconomic data and survey indicators of Swiss economic activity. Therefore, it provides timely and reliable warning signals if the health of the economy takes a turn for the worse.
A daily fever curve for the Swiss economy
Because macroeconomic data is published with a substantial delay, assessing the health of the economy during the rapidly evolving Covid-19 crisis is challenging. We develop a fever curve for the Swiss economy using publicly available daily financial market and news data. The indicator can be computed with a delay of one day. Moreover, it is highly correlated with macroeconomic data and survey indicators of Swiss economic activity. Therefore, it provides timely and reliable warning signals if the health of the economy takes a turn for the worse.