We show that the ECB's interest rate changes during 1999-2010 have been mainly driven by changes in economic activity in the Euro area. Changes in actual or expected future HICP inflation play a minor, if any, role.

Arguments for a prominent role for attention to the growth rate of monetary aggregates in the conduct of monetary policy are often based on references to low-frequency reduced-form relationships between money growth and inflation. The 'two-pillar Phillips curve' proposed by Gerlach (2004) has...

The role of asset prices in monetary policy has been widely debated. This paper examines the role that stock prices play in the monetary policy of the ECB. For this purpose, standard and augmented forward-looking Taylor rules are estimated for the ECB using monthly data between 1999 and 2005. Of...