Why intervention rarely works

Foreign-exchange-market intervention is generally ineffective when undertaken independent of monetary policy. But when undertaken as a goal of monetary policy, exchange-rate management can compromise price stability. This Economic Commentary explains the difficulties of implementing an intervention policy.Foreign exchange - Law and legislation ; Monetary policy

New results on the impact of central-bank intervention on deviations from uncovered interest parity

Germany, Japan, and the United States continue to view foreign exchange intervention as an effective instrument, although the mechanism through which it operates is unclear. In this paper, we use official data on daily dollar intervention to examine its impact on exchange-rate risk premia through both the portfolio-balance and expectations channels. We define the risk premium in terms of deviation from uncovered interest parity and model its behavior using generalized autoregressive conditional heteroscedasticity. Our evidence of portfolio-balance and expectations effects is inconsistent across subperiods of different exchange-rate-policy regimes. Also, unlike Dominguez (1990) and Loopesko (1984), we find no evidence that coordination of intervention improves its efficacy.Foreign exchange - Law and legislation

Intervention as information: a survey

Research has generally failed to find reliable connections between official exchange-market interventions and exchange rates that are consistent with either a monetary or a portfolio-balance theory of exchange-rate determination. Recently economists have suggested that intervention might sometimes influence exchange rates through its effects on agents’ expectations. This survey discusses newer research that analyzes informational aspects of intervention.Foreign exchange - Law and legislation

Intervention and the foreign exchange risk premium: an empirical investigation of daily effects

Currency markets have witnessed a sharp increase in government intervention since 1985. Many observers believe that this intervention promoted the dollar's depreciation between 1985 and early 1987, and that intervention has since helped to stabilize dollar exchange rates. This paper tests for a systematic effect of daily dollar intervention on exchange rate risk premia. We test for both portfolio balance effects and signaling influences by using daily data on central bank intervention (in dollars) against both the yen and the West German mark. Following work by Dominguez (1989) and Loopesko (1984), we measure the daily risk premium in terms of the deviation from uncovered interest parity. However, we follow other empirical analyses of exchange rates and allow for generalized conditional autoregressive heteroscedasticity (GARCH). Some evidence is found for both the portfolio balance and signaling channels.Foreign exchange - Law and legislation

Triggering on Forward Physics

The feasibility is investigated of a dedicated trigger stream in the CMS trigger menu, with an output rate of cal O (1)~kHz on the First Level Trigger and cal O (1)~Hz on the High Level Trigger. By combining jet trigger information from the CMS calorimeter with information from the TOTEM Roman Pot detectors at 220 m distance from the interaction point, the default dijet trigger thresholds foreseen in the CMS trigger tables can be lowered substantially while respecting the CMS trigger bandwidth limits. The efficacy of the dedicated diffractive trigger stream is demonstrated for hard single-diffractive and double-Pomeron exchange events

Forward Physics at the LHC (Elba 2010)

The papers review the main theoretical and experimental aspects of the Forward Physics at the Large Hadron Collider

First Results from the TOTEM Experiment

The first physics results from the TOTEM experiment are here reported, concerning the measurements of the total, differential elastic, elastic and inelastic pp cross-section at the LHC energy of $\sqrt{s}$ = 7 TeV, obtained using the luminosity measurement from CMS. A preliminary measurement of the forward charged particle $\eta$ distribution is also shown.Comment: Conference Proceeding. MPI@LHC 2010: 2nd International Workshop on Multiple Partonic Interactions at the LHC. Glasgow (UK), 29th of November to the 3rd of December 201

An agency relationship under general conditions of uncertainty: A game theory application to the doctor-patient interaction

The supply of information, particularly of bad news, in an agency relationship is a sensitive issue. We employ a game theory approach to investigate conflicts in the particular case of the doctor–patient relationship when information affects the emotions of patients. The doctor does not know the type of agent and the patient does not know how much information he is given. Hence, the paper obtains results when there is conflict, rather than common interest in the objectives of the two parties. The perfect Bayesian equilibrium describes beliefs and strategies which guarantee adherence to the doctor’s recommendation. We show also that the patient may non-adhere to the recommendation not only when the doctor fails to identify the patient’s needs but also if he falsely believes that the doctor has not done so

Climate Change Impacts on Iowa, 2010

Climate change is already affecting the way Iowans live and work. Without action to mitigate these effects, our future responses will become more complex and costly . The following policy recommendations are offered as initial steps to help safeguard our state’s economy, environment, and residents