BoE’s Haldane: Optimal interest rate path is less affected by increased market power

Below are some key takeaways from the speech titled “Market Power and Monetary Policy” delivered by the Bank of England chief economist Andy Haldane at the Jackson Hole Symposium.

• The net effect of increased market power could be a potentially significant rise in inflation variability, relative to the counterfactual case of stable and static mark-ups.
• As for monetary policy, the fact that these are trade-off inducing shock places limits on its stabilisation capacity.  
• The level and variability  of the optimal interest rate path is, as a result, less affected by increased market power, despite significant shifts in policy possibility frontiers and policymaker preferences.