The long-run uncovered interest rate parity in view of a trading strategy

Uncovered Interest Rate Parity (UIP) states that bonds in different denomination should produce the same returns if the maturities of the bonds are the same. Given this, if a foreign bond produces a lower holding period return than a home bond of the same maturity, for their remaining lives the same foreign bond ought to produce a return higher than the home bond. A test is designed according to this relationship. With 1 to 6 year interest rate data of U.S., Britain and Germany from 1979 to 2005, our test shows that this relationship is more reliable for 6-year interest rates than the shorter rates in general. This result lends support to the long-run UIP. A trading strategy is developed by utilizing this idea. We show that positive returns can be achieved by the strategy for bonds of longer horizons. This result also serves as indirect evidence of the long-run UIP.     

Uncovered Interest Parity at Long Horizons: Evidence on Emerging Economies*

This paper estimates uncovered interest parity (UIP) at long horizons using bilateral US dollar rates vis‐à‐vis mature economy and emerging market currencies. The paper finds support in favor of UIP for dollar rates vis‐à‐vis major mature economy currencies, but far less against emerging market currencies. There are also signs that political risk and the exchange risk premium help explain the empirical failure of UIP for these latter currencies. This suggests that whether UIP holds depends more on the currency than on the horizon.     

The precise form of uncovered interest parity: A heterogeneous panel application in ASEAN-5 countries

A notable feature of the empirical studies on uncovered interest parity (UIP) is that almost all published papers rely on the approximate form of UIP using substantially the same database of developed economies. It can, therefore, not be ruled out that the refusal of UIP condition is simply the outcome of a misspecification of a commonly used model and an elaborate data snooping process. In order to overcome this specification problem, this paper uses the precise form of UIP and examines its empirical validity based on a sample of ASEAN-5 member countries. Using the heterogeneous panel cointegration tests, our empirical results indicate that the gross domestic return and the uncovered gross foreign return are cointegrated in the long run. The long-run cointegrating coefficients are then estimated using the fully modified OLS (FMOLS) and the dynamic OLS (DOLS) proposed by Pedroni. The estimated long-run coefficients suggest that UIP only holds for Singapore. These results indicate that the Singapore financial market is highly integrated with the US market. As for the other four countries, the precise UIP hypothesis is strongly rejected suggesting that the financial markets in these emerging economies have not fully liberalized and, therefore, limited the international financial market integration. By examining international finance market linkages between ASEAN-5 and the US economy, we provide some policy implications that can be used as guiding tools for financing and investment decisions in ASEAN-5.     

On the Joint Test of the Uncovered Interest Parity and the Ex‐ante Purchasing Power Parity

This study revisits the relation between the uncovered interest parity (UIP), the ex‐ante purchasing power parity (EXPPP) and the real interest parity (RIP) for the UK and Japanese vs US data. The original contribution is on developing some joint coefficient‐based tests, obtained by rewriting the UIP, the EXPPP and the RIP as a set of cross‐equation restrictions in a vector autoregression (VAR) framework. Test results point to a “forward premium” bias in both the UIP and the EXPPP. The latter result is novel in the literature and stems from testing the PPP in expectational terms. Moreover, the results suggest a currency‐dependent pattern for the UIP, contrarily to the EXPPP equation. Finally, it is shown that conditioning the VAR on M3 growth differential has important explanatory power in resolving the aforementioned biases in both the UIP and EXPPP equations for the UK vs US data. At the same time, variables having a strong forward‐looking component (i.e. share prices) help recover a unitary coefficient in the UIP equation.     

Uncovered interest parity puzzle: does it really exist?

Most studies indicate the violation of the Uncovered Interest Parity (UIP) restrictions, and indeed, there are many who find a statistically significant and negative interest rate differential slope. This finding has now become known in international economics as the UIP puzzle. Using recent data on four major currencies vis-à-vis the US dollar and employing the Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) technique, our estimation results indicate the absence of any relationship between the interest rate differential and the expected change in the exchange rate, rather than the presence of the UIP puzzle.     

An Incomplete Markets Explanation of the Uncovered Interest Rate Parity Puzzle

A large literature attributes failure of uncovered interest rate parity (UIP) to the existence of a time‐varying risk premium. This paper presents a mechanism in a simple two‐country two‐good endowment economy with incomplete markets that generates sizeable deviations from UIP. In a parameterization where international wealth effects are important, liquidity constraints on an internationally traded bond and agents’ strong resulting precautionary motives successfully generates a time‐varying risk premium: countries that have accumulated large outstanding external positions have, being closer to the constraints, stronger precautionary motives and their asset carries a risk premium.     

What matters when? The impact of ECB communication on financial market expectations

This article analyses financial markets’ reaction to European Central Bank's (ECB) communication. We apply a novel indicator that quantifies the contents of the ECB's introductory statements and allows disentangling ECB statements on prices, the real and the monetary sector. We provide evidence that it matters what issue the ECB is speaking about: especially, the ECB's statements on price developments represent important news to financial markets. It also matters when the ECB affects markets: communication drives maturities above 4 months.     

The pricing and hedging of structured notes with systematic jump risk: An analysis of the USD knock-out reversed swap

Most of the interest rate derivative pricing models are jump-diffusion models, where the jump risk is assumed diversifiable. In this paper, we propose a Heath–Jarrow–Morton model with systematic jump risk to derive the no-arbitrage condition using Esscher transformation. Based on the Heath–Jarrow–Morton model with systematic jump risk, the dynamic process of the LIBOR market model with systematic jump risk is then developed. By decomposing the USD knock-out reversed swap into three derivative components, i.e., interest rate swap, interest rate digital call (IRDC) and cap, the pricing of the swap can be obtained from the dynamic process of the LIBOR market model with systematic jump risk. We show how the swap issuers/investors can hedge the swap risk using these three derivative components. The numerical analyses are conducted to show the impact of jump risk on the values of IRDC, cap and swap.     

Uncovered Interest Parity: Cross‐Sectional Evidence

Uncovered interest parity (UIP) is estimated for short‐term horizons from one month to 12 months using a large number of cross‐sectional bilateral exchange rates. In contrast to conventional time‐series UIP, cross‐sectional UIP is examined with a single‐equation estimation and panel regression model estimation. The exchange rates analyzed here include a broad spectrum of countries: developed, developing, low‐inflation, and high‐inflation countries. Based on the empirical evidence, there does not appear to be a well‐publicized UIP puzzle for cross‐sectional UIP, and the slope estimates remain largely between zero and one throughout the sample periods, with a few exceptions. Evidence of UIP is more clear for low inflation countries than for high inflation countries. As interest rate maturity becomes longer from one month to 12 months, the UIP relationship becomes weaker.     

The existence of uncovered interest parity in the CIS countries

This paper examines uncovered interest parity (UIP) for six countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) – Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Moldova – using quarterly data on spot exchange and three-month Treasury bill interest rates over the period 1995:01–2010:02. Three model specifications are used: the conventional ‘approximate’ interest differential model specified in first differences of exchange rates and the two unconventional ‘precise’ models specified in levels of exchange rates. Results obtained from the former model are consistent with UIP, since the coefficient on the interest differential is positive in all cases. These results imply that the CIS currencies offering a significant interest differential tend, on average, to depreciate over the sample period as UIP predicts. Results from the latter two models are strongly supportive of UIP in the long run in all cases, except for Armenia when a restricted specification is used, and Armenia, Moldova and Georgia when an unrestricted specification is used. Yet the deviations from UIP that are allowed in the short run may lead to the profitability of carry trade in the CIS currencies offering the significant interest differentials. The results confirm that carry trade is highly lucrative in all the CIS currencies, and outperforms the U.S. stock market.     

Uncovered interest parity in Central and Eastern Europe: Expectations and structural breaks

This paper examines the empirical validity of the hypothesis of uncovered interest parity (UIP) using data from five Central and Eastern European countries with floating exchange rates for the period 2003 to 2014. The analysis includes forward‐looking as well as static expectations and allows for different types of structural break. The variable depicting the deviation from strict UIP is stationary when expectations are forward looking, suggesting that it is not possible to reject the UIP hypothesis with a constant risk premium. The deviation from strict UIP is however typically not stationary when expectations are static, even when structural breaks are incorporated, leading to the rejection of the UIP hypothesis with a constant risk premium. The results underscore the central role of expectations for the UIP hypothesis.     

宏观经济变化对利率期限结构的影响机制研究

利率期限结构的变化受到各种宏观经济因素的影响,本文通过建立结构VAR模型,发现宏观经济冲击对不同期限利率水平产生显著影响,但不同冲击产生的影响不同;水平、倾斜和曲度3个因素可以解释90%以上的利率曲线变化,但水平因素的解释能力与成熟市场相比较弱;利用脉冲反应和方差分解,发现实际经济变化主导着利率的倾斜因素和曲度因素的变化,而货币政策是影响利率水平因素变化的主要原因,对其他因素的影响较弱,这一点与发达国家的成熟市场存在较大差别。     

Extreme daily changes in U.S. Dollar London inter-bank offer rates

The likelihood of extreme daily changes in London Interbank Offer rates are estimated using the peaks-over-threshold method developed from extreme value theory. Value at risk and expected shortfall for high quantiles are produced for the left and right tails of the distributions for each maturity. The Generalized Pareto distribution of the peaks-over-threshold method is found to be unsuitable for modeling exceedances above a high threshold for samples of simple daily changes in the LIBOR. When the series are transformed to logarithmic daily changes, extreme value analysis proceeds smoothly and yields useful information about the relative frequency or magnitudes of extreme events. The main consequence of this is that the risk statistics associated with a given change in the LIBOR depend on the initial rate level; at higher (lower) interest rates, changes of a given size are more (less) likely to occur.     

The validity of uncovered interest parity: Evidence from african members and non-member of the organisation of petroleum exporting countries (OPEC)

This paper re-examines uncovered interest parity (UIP) puzzle using Africa where there is dearth of studies. It extends the previous literature in the following ways. It captures the heterogeneity (oil and non-oil sources of shocks) in the region by considering both African members of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries- OPEC (Algeria, Nigeria and Angola) and non-member (South Africa) to ensure generalisation of findings. It also explores asymmetric exchange rate responses to diverse monetary policy stances from a new dimension by explicitly measuring asymmetries and capturing long- and short-run dynamics using the new non-linear autoregressive distributed lag (NARDL) and asymmetric component AC-GARCH models along with other recent methods for results' robustness. Results from alternative methods show that UIP fails to hold in the African members and non-member of OPEC which is attributable to capital mobility restrictions and currency risk. However, asymmetric and permanent/transitory exchange rate response to monetary policy stances was noticed with little evidence of risk premium dynamics and role of price level instability in UIP validity.     

Uncovered Interest Parity Revisited

A standard empirical finding in international finance is that countries with high nominal interest rates experience appreciations of their currencies, in contrast to predictions based on uncovered interest parity (UIP). However, tests of UIP have almost exclusively relied on data on short-term interest rates. In this paper, UIP is tested on long-term government bond yields. Since the presence of coupon payments induces a measurement error between the observed data and true returns, several different proxies for the latter are constructed. Furthermore, instrumental variable techniques are used. In contrast to thetypical finding, the results are rather favorable to UIP.     

Interest differentials and extreme support for uncovered interest rate parity

This paper addresses two findings from the empirical literature testing uncovered interest parity (UIP): (i) more favorable results when interest differentials (IDs) are large and (ii) instability across samples. Simulations demonstrate that explanations of the results using large IDs based on the hypothesis of a “zone of speculative inactivity” are inconsistent with empirical evidence. Furthermore, it is shown that, if agents forecast IDs based on long-run values, coefficient estimates will be unstable if rates of decay in IDs vary significantly and, for ex post UIP to hold, IDs must decay in absolute value. This is consistent with OECD country data.     

Mean Reversion of Short‐run Interest Rates in Emerging Countries*

In this paper we examine the stochastic behavior of short‐run interest rates in several emerging countries using fractional integration techniques. We allow for a much richer flexibility in the dynamic behavior of the series than the classical representations based on I(0) or I(1) processes. It appears that for Singapore and Thailand nominal interest rates are mean‐reverting, whereas for Mexico, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Korea, the presence of a unit‐root test depends on the assumptions regarding the residuals’ autocorrelation. The results also suggest that uncovered interest parity (UIP) can only hold for two emerging countries. For the other countries, the stabilization policies in the aftermath of the currency crises have led to the rejection of the UIP hypothesis.     

Forward-premium puzzle: is it time to abandon the usual regression?

The forward premium puzzle is usually evidenced by the rejection of the null hypothesis in the uncovered interest parity (UIP) regression. Because this parity need only hold in a risk-neutral world, a risk adjustment term is missing from the equation if speculation in foreign exchange markets is risky. We deal with this issue following the literature which assumes that discounted returns on foreign government bonds are log-normal, so we can linearize the Euler pricing equations (in level) and obtain a modified UIP system for which the risk adjustment term is obtained by applying to the pricing kernel-based relations a generalized autoregressive conditional heteroscedasticity-in-mean model. However, here we innovate by adopting a methodology which differs from all these related works. We construct and use a stochastic discount factor that does not depend on a specific model, by residing in the space of returns which we extract from the data by simply imposing the orthogonality restrictions represented by the Euler equations. So, we devise a purely statistical pricing kernel that performs well in in-sample level equations. Somewhat disappointingly, the risk premium inclusion in the conventional regression changes neither the significance nor the magnitude of the forecasting power of the forward premium for most currencies we study. The contrasting performance of the tests in level and in logs suggests that linearization may be to blame.     

TESTING UNCOVERED INTEREST PARITY: A CONTINUOUS‐TIME APPROACH*

Nowadays researchers can choose the sampling frequency of exchange rates and interest rates. If the degree of overlap is large relative to the sample size, standard GMM asymptotic theory provides unreliable inferences in uncovered interest parity (UIP) regression tests. We specify a continuous‐time model for exchange rates and forward premia robust to temporal aggregation, unlike existing discrete‐time models. We test the UIP restrictions on the continuous‐time model parameters and propose a novel specification test that compares estimators at different frequencies. Our results based on correctly specified models provide little support for UIP at both short and long horizons.     

Uncovered interest parity and risk premium convergence in Central and Eastern European countries

This study applies non-linear threshold unit-root test to investigate the non-stationary properties of the uncovered interest parity (UIP) with risk premium for ten Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries. We find that non-linear threshold unit-root test has higher power than linear method suggested by Caner and Hansen (2001) if the true data generating process of risk premium convergence is in fact a stationary non-liner process. We examine the validity of UIP from the non-linear point of view and provide robust evidence clearly indicating that UIP holds true for seven countries. Our findings point out that capital mobility and exchange market efficiency are in these CEE countries with non-linear way.