The next QE will be different

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From Citi via FTAlphaville:

We now think that the move to central banks endorsing fiscal policy and essentially monetizing the added spending will be relatively quick and direct, in the event of a sudden slump in the global activity. When we wrote earlier on this subject we arrived at fiscal after other alternatives had been exhausted {link}, but we now think it can be managed within the current monetary policy framework of most central banks.

The argument for fiscal policy via central bank monetization is that it directly injects purchasing power into the economy and will increase activity or inflation or both. QE increases the balance sheet but there is no guarantee that the increased lending and spending will result. In consequence many have argued for true helicopter money which is central bank financed final demand, rather than reserves creation.

Our ‘innovation’ here is to suggest that central banks will invite fiscal spending by announcing that their balance sheets will stay expanded permanently, or almost equivalently, be reduced only under extreme circumstances, and that they anticipate additional permanent expansion if targets are missed. Effectively this eliminates the government debt from the balance sheet, since any coupon payments on the debt are remitted back to the government via central bank profits. Literally the government is paying itself, which is not a bad deal if you can manage it. Many central banks are forbidden to monetize government debt, but governments will understand that permanent balance sheet expansion is an invitation to spend more, opening the fiscal channel.

If the government understands that the CB’s QE is permanent it opens the door to direct fiscal measures and increased demand. Congress may have different ideas on the virtues of additional spending, but they could be tempted by the prospect of Fed-funded tax cuts. There is nothing that forces fiscal policy to be highways and bridges, rather than low personal or corporate tax rates. There are plenty of Republican tax cutting proposals that rely on economic expansion or animal spirits to close the fiscal hole that the tax cut brings (for example). Combine such a proposal with balance sheet expansion and you have big-time money financed fiscal stimulus. Essentially you are combining Paul Krugman fiscal with Republican tax and Bernanke 2002 {link} monetary. Government spending and infrastructure could be used as well, but it is important to understand that fiscal expansion is not synonymous with government spending.

The announcement that the central bank portfolios would remain permanently enlarged could have an immediate effect on inflation expectations, in addition to any impact on real expected interest rates from anticipated fiscal spending. Low policy rates at the front end and balance sheet expansion preventing the fiscal injection from pushing up medium-long term rates are a powerful stimulus combination ( I think this was Jacob Viner’s recommendation during the Great Depression). The fiscal spending means that monetary policy is pulling rather than pushing on a string so it makes both policy tools more effective.

The rates effect is very likely positive at the medium and long end as expectations of growth and inflation rise. To get the maximum activity and inflation boost the central bank may have to keep policy rates low or zero, so that short-term rates become negative relative to inflation expectations. This introduces some ambiguity into the currency effects but we think that the prospect of normalizing activity and hitting policy targets will be currency positive.

There is the possibility that this ends up as an activity negative if the fiscal easing is promised, but not implemented, as rates would rise, effectively tightening monetary policy, without the boost form fiscal. So generating expectations without follow-through is dangerous.

We view this note as both positive and normative. The positive side is that it discusses how central banks are likely to respond if they face a negative shock when rates are already zero, and even they must be having some second thoughts on the effectiveness of QE. The normative side is that increasingly the absence of fiscal policy is viewed as one of the reason for a less than satisfactory recovery and we outline a practical way by which central banks could endorse fiscal policy without fully dropping the idea of independence and non-monetization.

Yes, yet the political opposition to this will be immense and in some ways understandably so. I can see Japan doing it but the US where private capital allocation is sacrosanct? If not handled right it would also be one enormous rent seeking hog trough. To do it right you would you would need to hand over the printed investment decision function to an independent technocratic body.

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The impacts on markets would also be very different with some real impact in the economy at last and much less impact on financial market inflation. You may not, therefore, end up with more growth but it would certainly be of better quality (assuming it is not squandered on bridges to nowhere).

About the author
David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics and economics portal. He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.