The Monthly Report April 2014 comments on the reliability of international organisations' estimates of the output gap as well as on the implications of the Eurosystem's monetary operations during the financial crisis. Furthermore, some approaches to explaining the behaviour of inflation since the last financial and economic crisis are described.

The April Monthly Report illuminates the fundamental theory and evolution of metrics used to measure equity market levels, besides shedding light on the Phillips curve and its use in analysing prices and projecting inflation rates in Germany.