This paper examines the structural distortions introduced by the widespread use of post-fixed bonds in Brazil’s monetary policy framework. Unlike other economies where monetary tightening adversely affects banks’ balance sheets, Brazil’s financial institutions often benefit from such policies due to their exposure to post-fixed instruments. This creates perverse incentives that undermine the effectiveness of monetary policy transmission. Using the concept of Evolutionarily Stable Strategies, we argue that the current equilib-rium is suboptimal and self-reinforcing.
Cite this paper
Silva, E. M. , Bellamy, M. S. G. , Rosa, R. A. B. M. D. and Feijo, A. B. (2025). Brazil’s Monetary Policy Transmission Puzzle. Open Access Library Journal, 12, e14533. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/oalib.1114533.
Azrieli, Y., Chambers, C.P. and Healy, P.J. (2018) Incentives in Experiments: A Theoretical Analysis. Journal of Political Economy, 126, 1472-1503. https://doi.org/10.1086/698136
Gächter, S., Kaiser, J. and Königstein, M. (2025) In-centives Crowd Out Voluntary Cooperation: Evidence from Gift-Exchange Experiments. Cambridge University Press.
Kamenica, E. (2012) Behavioral Economics and Psychology of Incentives. Annual Review of Economics, 4, 427-452. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-economics-080511-110909
United States Department of Jus-tice (2015) Five Major Banks Agree to Parent-Level Guilty Pleas. https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/five-major-banks-agree-parent-level-guilty-pleas
Tiberto, B.P. and de Mendonça, H.F. (2023) Effects of Sustainable Monetary and Fiscal Policy on FDI Inflows to EMDE Countries. Banco Central do Brasil. (Working Paper Series, No. 575).
Cevik, S. and Miryugin, F. (2023) It’s Never Different: Fiscal Policy Shocks and Inflation. IMF Working Papers, 2023, Article 1. https://doi.org/10.5089/9798400242878.001
Gonçalves, C., Rodrigues, M. and Genta, F. (2025) Monetary Policy and Inflation Expectations: High-Frequency Evidence from Brazil. International Monetary Fund. IMF Working Paper WP/25/048.
Bernanke, B.S. and Gertler, M. (1995) Inside the Black Box: The Credit Channel of Monetary Policy Transmission. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 9, 27-48. https://doi.org/10.1257/jep.9.4.27
Tavares, D.P., Montes, G.C. and Guillén, O.T.C. (2013) Transmissão da política mone-tária pelos canais de tomada de risco e de crédito no Braisl. Banco Central do Brasil. (Trabalhos para Discussão, No. 308).
Ayres, J., Garcia, M., Guillen, D.A. and Kehoe, P.J. (2019) The Monetary and Fiscal History of Brazil, 1960-2016. National Bureau of Economic Research.
Elias, L. and Guimaraes, B. (2024) This Is Not America: The Credit Channel of Monetary Policy in Brazil. Economía, 23, 137-174. https://doi.org/10.31389/eco.391
Leigh, D. and Xu, R. (2025) Monetary Policy Transmission to Lending Rates. IMF Working Papers, 2025, Article 1. https://doi.org/10.5089/9798229019002.001
Jiang, E.X., Matthews, G. and Pelizzon, L. (2024) Monetary Tightening and U.S. Bank Fragility in 2023: Mark-to-Market Losses and Uninsured Leverage. National Bureau of Economic Research.
Neumark, D. and Sharpe, S.A. (1992) Market Struc-ture and the Nature of Price Rigidity: Evidence from the Market for Consumer Deposits. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 107, 657-680. https://doi.org/10.2307/2118485
Drechsler, I., Savov, A. and Schnabl, P. (2017) The Deposits Channel of Monetary Policy. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 132, 1819-1876. https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjx019
Egan, M., Hortaçsu, A. and Matvos, G. (2017) Deposit Competition and Finan-cial Fragility: Evidence from the US Banking Sector. American Economic Review, 107, 169-216. https://doi.org/10.1257/aer.20150342
Egan, M., Lewellen, S. and Sunderam, A. (2021) The Cross-Section of Bank Value. The Review of Financial Studies, 35, 2101-2143. https://doi.org/10.1093/rfs/hhab089
Wang, Y., Whited, T.M., Wu, Y. and Xiao, K. (2022) Bank Market Power and Monetary Policy Transmission: Evidence from a Structural Estima-tion. The Journal of Finance, 77, 2093-2141. https://doi.org/10.1111/jofi.13159
Cowden, C.C. (2012) Game Theory, Evolutionary Stable Strategies and the Evolution of Biological Interactions. Na-ture Education Knowledge, 3, Article 6.