'Money and inflation during Covid-19 - truly, a very monetary experiment': Juan Castañeda

Professor Juan Castañeda begins his presentation with a quotation from Jerome Powell, the Chairman of the US Federal Reserve, that the relationship between money and inflation ended 40 years ago. Neither Professor Castañeda nor Professor Tim Congdon agree with this. They were both alarmed when the figures being published by the Fed in early 2020 indicated that broad money growth was surging. A similar phenonmenon, albeit on not so large a scale, could be seen in the UK and the Eurozone. By contrast, in Japan and Switzerland, there was a much smaller increase in growth of broad money. When the inflation rates are compared, figures were much higher in the UK, US and Eurozone, even though Switzerland and Japan were also affected by the Ukraine war and supply chain issues. They saw some increase in inflation, but it never approached double-digit levels. In conclusion, there is strong evidence of a link between broad money growth and inflation. Monetary analysis should therefore be incorporated into inflation forecasting. From the first session of the 2025 IIMR Monetary Conference 'Why were so many economists wrong about inflation in the early 2020s?' that was held at the University of Buckingham on November 12th, 2025.