Payment service providers passed the transaction tax on to their clients in several steps and to a significant degree, both in the spring, upon introduction of the tax, and in the autumn, when the rates of tax were raised. For cash withdrawals and bank transfers, the tax was typically passed on...

During the crisis, firms saw their profitability deteriorate sharply in the weakening demand environment, which they reacted to by curbing labour costs. Cost-side adjustment thus acted as a buffer against inflationary pressure. In earlier analyses, we investigated this behaviour of firms using...

The shape and dynamics of the yield curve provide useful information in the analysis of current economic and financial developments, and market expectations. This article describes the key theoretical factors affecting the yield curve and examines their role in the developments in advanced and...

Christopher D. Carroll is an economics professor at Johns Hopkins University Baltimore and research associate at NBER. He obtained his BA from Harvard University in 1986 and his PhD from MIT in 1990. He first worked as an economist at the Federal Reserve Board and later took a job at Johns...

Before the recent economic crisis, part-time employment was very low in Hungary. During the crisis, however, the most rapid increase in the number of part-time employees within the European Union was observed in Hungary. Part-time employment increased in a number of European Union countries for...

This article investigates how turnover has changed in the Hungarian payment system over the almost 18-month period since the introduction of intraday clearing (2 July 2012). A development exercise of a similar scale took place in Hungarian payments when VIBER was introduced in 1999, which...

During the financial and economic crisis, non-price type restrictive factors came to the fore in financial markets as well; these mainly consist of limits and margin requirements. Specific relevant signs were observed in the domestic financial markets in late 2011 and early 2012: following the...

This study examines the set of indicators of the early warning system used within the framework of the new Macroeconomic Imbalance Procedure introduced by the European Commission. The primary objective of the procedure is to call the attention of member countries to dangerous developments that...

Central banks primarily achieve their inflation targets by changing their key instrument, the central bank base rate, to the required extent and with careful timing. If the inflation outlook deteriorates and the forward-looking inflation rate exceeds the target, monetary policy raises interest...

In addition to monetary policy, macroprudential policy can be fundamentally used by countries to contain risks threatening the stability of their financial systems. As macroprudential policy becomes more important, European countries have also begun to consider the establishment of national...