Macro-Financial Stability in the COVID-19 Crisis: Some Reflections

The global financial system has shown remarkable resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic, despite a sharp decline in economic activity and the initial financial market upheaval in March 2020. This paper takes stock of the factors that contributed to this resilience, focusing on the role of monetary and financial policies. In response to the pandemic-induced crisis, major central banks acted swiftly and decisively, cutting policy rates, introducing new asset purchase programs, providing liquidity support for the banking system, and creating several emergency facilities to sustain the flow of credit to the real economy. Several emerging market central banks also deployed asset purchase programs for the first time. While the pandemic crisis has underscored the importance of policies in preventing calamitous financial outcomes, it has also brought to the fore some unintended consequences of policy actions—in particular, of providing prolonged monetary policy support and applying regulation to specific segments of the financial system rather than taking a broader approach—that could undermine financial stability in the future.