monetair beleid

The macroeconomic policy revolution accelerated by Covid-19 implies that central bank policy rates and nominal bonds yields will be less responsive to rising inflation pressures over the medium-term. The potential for higher consumer price inflation over the medium-term is still underappreciated, we think, because the new central bank policy frameworks and global cost pressures are not fully reflected in private sector inflation expectations. Neither is the shift towards a closer coordination between monetary and fiscal policy. Combined with the fact that bond yields remain close to their effective lower bound and that authorities need to rely to a greater extent on fiscal policy, the role of government bonds in investment portfolios as a hedge against risk-off events such as the one in March 2020 is increasingly challenged. In contrast to past inflation episodes, less-responsive nominal interest rates and bonds yields mean that government bonds are also becoming less effective as store of value. 

Monetary policy implications of three different forms of digital money – cryptocurrencies, stablecoins and central bank digital currency (CBDC) – are discussed. Because of their limited adoption and lack of moneyness, cryptocurrencies are unlikely to constrain monetary policy in the foreseeable future. Stablecoins, by contrast, could reach a critical size, in particular if they were sponsored by large companies with a sizeable potential user base. CBDC would constitute a digital representation of the official currency that is accessible to everybody and could entail material consequences for monetary policy and financial stability. At the current stage, central bankers mostly feel that a convincing monetary policy motivation is missing or are concerned about the disruptive potential for financial stability. As digitalisation of payments is evolving quickly, the assessment of costs and benefits associated with CBDC may change in the future.