Media Treatment of Monetary Policy Surprises and Their Impact on Firms' and Consumers' Expectations

Abstract We investigate whether monetary policy announcements affect firms' and consumers' expectations by considering their media treatment. We initially use standard monetary policy surprise measures and analyze how the main general newspapers in France report on the announcements. Eighty‐five percent of the monetary policy surprises are either not associated with the newspapers reporting a change in the monetary policy stance or have a sign inconsistent with the media report. Only when we consider media‐consistent monetary policy surprises do we find that consumers and firms respond to monetary policy announcements. The economic tonality of the media reports drives the sign of consumers' response.