Assessing asset purchases within the ECB’s securities markets programme

Arbeitspapier

We assess the yield impact of asset purchases within the ECB’s Securities Markets Programme in five euro area sovereign bond markets during 2010-11. Identification is non-trivial and based on time series panel data regression on predetermined purchases and control covariates. In addition to large and economically significant announcement effects, we find an average impact at the five year maturity per e1 bn of bond purchases of approximately -1 to -2 bps (Italy), -3 bps (Ireland), -4 to -6 bps (Spain), -6 to -9 bps (Portugal), and up to -17 to -21 bps (Greece). The impact depends on market size and a default risk signal, and is approximately -3 basis points at a five-year maturity for purchases of 1/1000 of the respective debt market. Bond yield volatility is lower on intervention days for most SMP countries, due to less extreme movements occurring when the Eurosystem is active as a buyer. A dynamic specification points to both transitory and longer-lived effects from purchases.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: ECB Working Paper ; No. 1587

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models: Time-Series Models; Dynamic Quantile Regressions; Dynamic Treatment Effect Models; Diffusion Processes; State Space Models ; Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates
• Subject: Central bank asset purchases ; effectiveness of non-standard monetary policy measures ; European Central Bank ; Securities Markets Programme

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Eser, Fabian ; Schwaab, Bernd
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): European Central Bank (ECB)
• (where): Frankfurt a. M.
• (when): 2013

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/154020
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:45 AM CET