Does a Bias in FOMC Policy Directives Help Predict Intermeeting Policy Changes?

Since 1984 the FOMC has issued directives indicating a bias toward easing or tightening. This paper investigates the information content of these asymmetric directives for the likelihood of inter-meeting changes in policy during the Greenspan chairmanship. If policy is measured by the change in the average daily federal funds rate after a directive is issued, the results indicate that a bias predicts a significant change in the average funds rate. If policy is measured qualitatively by whether the target for the federal funds rate changed, a bias significantly affects the probability that the target will be changed.