The expectations hypothesis of the term structure when interest rates are close to zero$

In an economy where cash can be stored costlessly in nominal terms, the nominal interest rate is bounded below by zero. This paper derives the implications of this non-negativity constraint for the term structure and shows that it induces a nonlinear and convex relation between short- and longterm interest rates. The long-term rate responds asymmetrically to changes in the short-term rate, and by less than that is predicted by the benchmark linear model. In particular, a decrease in the short-term rate produces a smaller response in the long-term rate than an increase of the same magnitude. The empirical predictions of the model are examined using data from Japan. r 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.