Multidimensional financial development,exporter behavior and export diversification

Financial development shapes export sector performance because exporters need external finance and face credit constraints. Previous empirical research has relied largely on single-country studies. The Exporter Dynamics Database (EDD), which features firm-level exports from over 60 countries, reveals differences in the microstructure of the export sector across countries. In this paper, we first provide new evidence that these differences are related to cross-country variation in financial development and structure. Second, we combine the EDD and multidimensional data on financial development with a global database on export diversification. This study is the first to examine how macrolevel export diversification is determined by the microcharacteristics of the export sector. This approach is novel in the empirical literature on export diversification. According to our cross-country analysis, access to domestic financial services positively contributes to export diversification by increasing the number of small exporters, as financial services ease the credit constraints these exporters face.     

Quantifying the impact of financial development on economic development

How important is financial development for economic development? A costly state verification model of financial intermediation is presented to address this question. The model is calibrated to match facts about the U.S. economy, such as the intermediation spreads and the firm-size distributions for 1974 and 2004. It is then used to study the international data using cross-country interest-rate spreads and per-capita GDPs. The analysis suggests a country like Uganda could increase its output by 116 percent if it could adopt the world?s best practice in the financial sector. Still, this amounts to only 29 percent of the gap between Uganda?s potential and actual output.     

Banking on the FED: QE1-2-3 and the Rebalancing of the Global Economy

Growing income inequality in most countries in the 1990s and 2000s led to a global shortfall between supply and demand. The US economy bridged this shortfall domestically and globally by blowing successive equity market and housing bubbles, but these produced ever more severe financial crises. Rebalancing after the 2008 crisis required trade surplus countries to expand their non-traded sectors, but rebalancing is never immaculate. Instead, the Federal Reserve Bank's three rounds of Large-Scale Asset Purchases, or quantitative easing, shifted investment flows towards some developed and developing economies. As a matter of accounting, capital inflows led to shrinking trade surpluses in those countries. However, their relatively undeveloped securities markets mean that rebalancing largely occurred through rising housing prices, mirroring the same unsustainable phenomenon the USA experienced in the 2000s. In effect, the USA shifted part of its unsustainably large non-traded sector back to trade surplus countries by causing the real-estate part of the non-traded sector in surplus countries to expand. However, this is not a sustainable solution to global trade and financial imbalances in the long run, and risks producing the same kind of crises the USA experienced in 2008.     

Bank efficiency and industry growth during financial crises

Financial crises pose many problems for growth, and in this time of increasing financial instability it is important to fully understand why this happens. Many papers have analyzed the relationship between growth and a country's level of financial development using private credit, which leads to several unexpected problems. However, very few have used bank efficiency to gauge the development of the financial sector. The aim of this paper is to analyze the effect of bank efficiency on value-added growth of industries that were most dependent on external financing during the financial crisis. Specifically, it uses the data envelopment analysis (DEA) method to measure the efficiency of the banking sector across countries, according to the empirical strategy offered by Rajan and Zingales (1998). Our main result shows that bank efficiency relaxed credit constraints and increased the growth rate for financially dependent industries during the crisis. This finding shows the great but overlooked importance of bank efficiency in mitigating the negative effects of financial crises on growth for industries that are most dependent on external financing.     

Bubbles and Crises

In recent financial crises a bubble, in which asset prices rise, is followed by a collapse and widespread default. Bubbles are caused by agency relationships in the banking sector. Investors use money borrowed from banks to invest in risky assets, which are relatively attractive because investors can avoid losses in low payoff states by defaulting on the loan. This risk shifting leads investors to bid up the asset prices. Risk can originate in both the real and financial sectors. Financial fragility occurs when positive credit expansion is insufficient to prevent a crisis.     

Does the inequality-credit-crisis nexus exist? An empirical re-examination

ABSTRACT

Rajan claims that rising inequality led to financial crises through credit booms in the U.S. Kumhof and Ranciere provide a theoretical formulation for this hypothesis. However, their assertions are not supported by cross-country evidence found in the work of Bordo and Meissner. A few subsequent empirical studies, albeit inspired by this pioneering work, find new evidence not in line with its conclusion but with the Rajan hypothesis. To clarify this controversial issue, we base our study on the B-M framework, resort to different estimators, and employ more model specifications by incorporating the role of deindustrialization. We find strong evidence for the inequality-credit-crisis nexus as modelled by Kumhof et al.     

Credit information sharing and banking crises: An empirical investigation

We study the effect of credit information sharing on the likelihood of banking crises using a comprehensive cross-country dataset for the period from 1975 to 2006. The empirical analysis shows that credit information sharing reduces the likelihood of banking crises and it does more so in low income countries. The effect is statistically and economically significant, and applies to both public registries and private bureaus. Furthermore, we show that credit information sharing reduces the impact of rapid credit growth on banking crises. Specifically, rapid credit growth is less likely to lead to a banking crisis in countries with credit information sharing.     

Crises and the International System

This paper reviews the recent experience of financial crises since 2007, including the continuing crisis in the euro zone. I seek to answer three main questions: In what respects (if any) is the recent experience of crises novel? How special is the euro crisis? And what changes in the international financial architecture can reduce the chances of future crises?     

Speculation-led economic development: a post-Keynesian interpretation of financial liberalization programmes in the Third World

The paper presents a post-Keynesian interpretation of the consequences of financial liberalization (FL) programmes in less developed countries (LDCs). The interpretation advanced here incorporates the new-Keynesian concepts of adverse selection and credit rationing into a post-Keynesian framework. It is argued that FL can lead to a particular kind of development, ‘speculation-led economic development’, which is characterized by a preponderance of risky investment practices and shaky financial structures. In addition, FL is likely to induce an increase in directly unproductive profit-seeking activities, a greater likelihood of financial crises, a misallocation of credit and, ultimately, diminished rates of real sector economic growth. Given the likelihood of these outcomes (as well as their realization in LDCs that have implemented FL), FL programmes are argued to be a poor foundation for stable and sustained real-sector economic growth, especially in the context of resource-scarce LDCs.     

Price-level targeting rules and financial shocks: The case of Canada

How important are the benefits of low price-level uncertainty in the presence of financial shocks? This paper explores the desirability of price-level path targeting in a small open economy with credit frictions à la Bernanke et al. (1999). The model features credit flows and exogenous shocks that originated in both domestic and international credit markets. Financial shocks, exacerbating the distortion generated by the debt-deflation channel, provide a rational for an interest-rate response to the price-level. Indeed, a price-level targeting rule reduces the trade-off between the nominal debt distortion and the inefficiency generated by nominal price stickiness. The policy implications are based on social welfare evaluations. Parameter's uncertainty does not significantly affect the main results.     

双重委托—代理视角下的金融中介、金融加速器与经济波动的研究

本文在BGG模型基础上,建立了包含企业、金融中介、投资者的双重委托—代理模型,将金融中介纳入信贷市场摩擦的分析框架内。分析了金融中介自身受信贷约束时,其资产净值变化对经济产生的金融加速器效应。得出在双重委托代理的信用契约下,企业外部融资溢价不但受自身资产净值的影响,还受金融中介资产净值的影响。各种外部冲击通过信贷市场中金融中介的传导对经济波动造成进一步放大的效应,经济波动的金融加速器效应在考虑金融中介资产净值的影响后得到了增强。     

Informal Credit Markets and the Transmission of Monetary Policy: Evidence from South Korea

This paper is an empirical investigation of the transmission of monetary policy in South Korea. It combines modern mainstream macroeconomics with aspects of a developing economy with financial dualism through a simple IS-LM type model that explicitly incorporates an informal credit market. Vector autoregression analysis, with both semistructural and structural identifications, confirms the importance of a credit variable as a policy tool. The results show direct credit allocation by the central bank had a significant impact on output, prices, and the interest rate in the informal sector. Previous theoretical and empirical findings of "stagflationary" effects of monetary policy are refuted.     

双重委托-代理视角下的金融中介、金融加速器与经济波动的研究

本文在BGG模型基础上,建立了包含企业、金融中介、投资者的双重委托一代理模型,将金融中介纳入信贷市场摩擦的分析框架内。分析了金融中介自身受信贷约束时,其资产净值变化对经济产生的金融加速器效应。得出在双重委托代理的信用契约下,企业外部融资溢价不但受自身资产净值的影响,还受金融中介资产净值的影响。各种外部冲击通过信贷市场中金融中介的传导对经济波动造成进一步放大的效应,经济波动的金融加速器效应在考虑金融中介资产净值的影响后得到了增强。     

Welfare and sectoral productivity shifts in a small open economy with imported agricultural inputs: The case of Sub-Saharan Africa

This paper studies the impact of sectoral productivity growth on welfare in Sub-Saharan Africa. Using the analytical framework of a DSGE model, the main finding is that, for the estimated values of structural parameters, the allocation of scarce resources to the tradable agricultural sector for boosting productivity leads to a greater increase in overall welfare than would be the case if they were allocated to the non-traded goods sector.

     

On the credit and exchange rate channels of central bank asset purchases in a monetary union

Throughout the euro area crisis, financial fragmentation across jurisdictions became a prime concern for the single monetary policy. The ECB broadened the scope of its instruments and enacted a series of non-standard measures to engineer an appropriate degree of policy accommodation. The transmission of these measures through the currency union remained highly dependent on the financial structure and conditions prevailing in various regions. This paper explores the country-specific macroeconomic transmission of selected non-standard measures from the ECB using a global DSGE model with a rich financial sector: we extend the six-region multi-country model of Darracq Pariès et al. (2016), introducing credit and exchange rate channels for central bank asset purchases. The portfolio rebalancing frictions are calibrated to match the sovereign yield and exchange rate responses after ECB's Asset Purchase Programme (APP) first announcement. The domestic transmission of the APP through the credit intermediation chain is significant and quite heterogenous across the largest euro area countries. The introduction of global portfolio frictions on euro area government bond holdings by international investors opens up for a larger depreciation of the euro. The interaction between international and domestic channels affect the magnitude and the cross-country distribution of the APP impact.     

Interaction of formal and informal financial markets in quasi-emerging market economies

The primary objective of this paper is to investigate the interaction of formal and informal financial markets and their impact on economic activity in quasi-emerging market economies. Using a four-sector dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model with asymmetric information in the formal financial sector, we come up with three fundamental findings. First, we demonstrate that formal and informal financial sector loans are complementary in the aggregate, suggesting that an increase in the use of formal financial sector credit creates additional productive capacity that requires more informal financial sector credit to maintain equilibrium. Second, it is shown that interest rates in the formal and informal financial sectors do not always change together in the same direction. We demonstrate that in some instances, interest rates in the two sectors change in diametrically opposed directions with the implication that the informal financial sector may frustrate monetary policy, the extent of which depends on the size of the informal financial sector. Thus, the larger the size of the informal financial sector the lower the likely impact of monetary policy on economic activity. Third, the model shows that the risk factor (probability of success) for both high and low risk borrowers plays an important role in determining the magnitude by which macroeconomic indicators respond to shocks.     

A DYNAMIC MODEL OF TOURISM, EMPLOYMENT AND WELFARE: THE CASE OF HONG KONG

Abstract.  The present paper uses a dynamic open-economy model with wage indexation to examine the impact of tourism on employment and welfare. Both short-run and long-run situations are analysed. It is well known that tourism converts non-traded goods into tradable goods. An increase in the demand for a non-traded good raises its relative price, which results in an expansion of the non-traded sector at the expense of the traded goods sector. This output shift raises labour employment in the short run. However, in the long run, the higher relative price leads to higher wages, resulting in a negative impact on labour employment. If the output effect is dominant, the expansion in tourism raises employment and welfare. However, under realistic conditions tourism may lower both labour employment and welfare due to rising costs. These results are demonstrated by simulating a dynamic model for the case of Hong Kong.     

Financial reform and the efficiency of credit allocation in Korea

This study analyzes some of the structural problems associated with the Korean financial sector, and investigates the efficiency of credit allocation by the financial system over the period from 1970 to 1996. Using data at the level of 32 industrial branches, we find no evidence that credit flows were directed sectors that were more profitable, either before or after financial reforms were initiated in the 1980s. We also find that the financial support did not contribute to improve the performance of the favored industries over time.     

Banking,currency, stock market and debt crises in Spain, 1850–1995

What type of crisis is generated when debt increases? We extend the literature by framework by introducing currency and stock market crises in the analysis. We apply our proposal to the case of Spain, since this is a country that has experienced a very important amount of financial crises from the nineteenth century onwards. We find the same results as the previous literature for the determinants of banking and debt crises but substituting external and public debt with perpetual debt and where perpetual debt has a less important role than crises in the private sector. Moreover, we find evidence in favour of the hypothesis that currency crises depend strongly and positively on financial centre crises and negatively and mildly on perpetual debt. We justify the negative relalionship due to an inflation tax. We also find evidence in favour of the hypothesis that stock market crises depend only positively and strongly on financial centre crises.     

Why are some people (and countries) more protectionist than others?

We analyze two cross-country data sets that contain information on attitudes toward trade as well as a broad range of socio-demographic and other indicators. We find that pro-trade preferences are significantly and robustly correlated with an individual's level of human capital, in the manner predicted by the factor endowments model. Preferences over trade are also correlated with the trade exposure of the sector in which an individual is employed: individuals in non-traded sectors tend to be the most pro-trade, while individuals in sectors with a revealed comparative disadvantage are the most protectionist. Third, an individual's relative economic status has a very strong positive association with pro-trade attitudes. Finally, non-economic determinants, in the form of values, identities, and attachments, play an important role in explaining the variation in preferences over trade. High degrees of neighborhood attachment and nationalism/patriotism are associated with protectionist tendencies.