The Response of Interest Rates to US and UK Quantitative Easing

Abstract

We analyse declines in government bond yields following announcements by the Federal Reserve and the Bank of England of plans to buy longer term debt. Using dynamic term structure models, we decompose US and UK yields into expectations about future short‐term interest rates and term premiums. We find that declines in US yields mainly reflected lower expectations of future short‐term interest rates, while declines in UK yields appeared to reflect reduced term premiums. Thus, the relative importance of the signalling and portfolio balance channels of quantitative easing may depend on market institutional structures and central bank communication policies.