Carlo Rosa

This paper examines the evolution of the financial market impact of Federal Reserve monetary policy announcements. I begin by describing the changes in Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) communication practices, especially during and after the recent financial crisis. Then, I discuss the financial market effects of three types of monetary policy announcements: decisions about the current level of the federal funds target rate, forward guidance about the future path of the federal funds rate, and announcements about future large-scale asset purchases...

This paper proposes a new objective methodology for analysing the verbatim transcripts of central bank announcements. I apply a statistical method based on locally recurring word patterns, the descending hierarchical classification algorithm, to identify the characteristic themes of the monthly press conferences of the President of the ECB. The econometric evidence suggests that these press conferences convey information to the public. Moreover, the reaction of market rates strongly depends on the principal themes of the statement.