Asymmetric exchange rate pass-through in an emerging market economy: The case of Mexico

This paper applies a nonlinear Autoregressive Distribute Lag to examine the exchange rate pass-through into consumer price inflation in Mexico. Overall, the evidence confirmed that ignoring the asymmetric (sign) effect of exchange rate movements on inflation may lead to incorrect inferences and policy conclusions. Exchange rate fluctuation is transferred to prices level more during currency depreciation than appreciation. We compare the macroeconomic performances between pre- and post-inflation targeting, and our findings reaffirmed that the pass-through has weakened significantly after launching inflation targeting in 2001. This result implies that low inflation in the sample period examined is good for Mexico because exchange rate pass-through declines after 2001. Consumer prices have become less responsive to exchange rate movements. We further observe a revival (strengthening) of oil price pass-through to domestic inflation in the post- inflation targeting period.     

中美双边汇率对美国消费价格传递效应的实证研究

人民币升值的价格传递效果是近年来的一个研究热点。已有学者利用人民币汇率变动与关国对我国进口价格指数等数据进行研究,得出了人民币汇率变动的价格传递极低的结论。本文选择美国与我国贸易品相关性较高的消费品价格指数,利用2005年7月至2008年10月之间的月度数据,采用Johsen＆Juselius协整检验、误差修正模型分析汇改以来人民币汇率升值期间中关双边名义汇率变动的价格传递效应。研究发现中关双边名义汇率波动对美国消费物价的影响是显著的,长短期传递系数分别为O．1871、0．1917,并在此研究中得到几点政策启示。     

Interest rate pass-through in India

The success of the interest rate channel depends upon the size and speed with which retail interest rates respond to changes in policy or money market interest rates. This study estimates the dynamic elasticities of the pass-through of the official monetary policy rate to the money market and retail interest rates in India and examines whether the speed and magnitudes of the pass-through have changed following introduction of the Liquidity Adjustment Facility in 2000. The results show that the speed of adjustment is highest for call rates and lowest for 364-day Treasury Bill yield. The pass-through elasticities with respect to call rate show marginal improvement in the case of deposit and lending rates and worsening in the case of Treasury Bills.     

Exchange rate pass-through to bilateral import prices

This paper estimates exchange rate pass-through for a unique set of bilateral US import prices over the period 1992–2006. It finds evidence of a significant decline in pass-through to US import prices from some, but not all, of the trading partners in the sample. These differences rule out a universal decline in pass-through rates to bilateral US import prices. They further indicate a growing divergence in the import price response to a uniform dollar decline.     

Gauging exchange rate targeting

In this paper, we examine whether a monetary authority targets the exchange rate, per se, or instead simply appears to do so as it responds to the exchange rate and other variables in service to inflation and output targets. We combine data-rich estimation with a system of forward-looking equations in order to disentangle the possibilities. The combined approach reveals the potentially misleading nature of standard estimates of the extent of exchange rate and inflation targeting. We illustrate the approach by applying it to two de jure inflation targetters, Canada and Korea. In contrast to standard methods and much past work, we find that neither country targets its exchange rate; and, both are bona fide inflation targetters.     

The impact of exchange rate risk on international asset pricing under various market structures

This article derives international equity pricing relations by taking into account inflationary exchange risk under various forms of market segmentation/integration. In a mean-variance framework, a two-country, two-period, two-goods model is analyzed under three different market structures: segmented, mildly segmented and integrated. It is found that as long as investors are consuming imported goods, in the presence of market frictions, inflationary exchange risk is an important determinant of real equity prices. This is the case because inflationary exchange rate affects the real purchasing power of investors.

State-dependent exchange rate pass-through behavior

We estimate a Bayesian threshold vector autoregression (TVAR) to study the relationship between exchange rate pass-through and economic activity in Canada and Mexico. Both the model comparison and the analysis of impulse–response functions provide strong evidence of a nonlinear relationship and suggest that the exchange rate pass-through is dependent on the state of the economy. In particular, the pass-through coefficient is higher when the growth rate of output is large, and this difference is statistically significant across regimes for both countries. Furthermore, the results show that the degree of pass-through is complete in the case of import prices and that it falls along the distribution chain of goods.     

The interest rate pass-through in the Euro area during the global financial crisis

This paper uses panel vector autoregressive (VAR) models for euro area member countries to explore the widening of retail bank interest rate spreads that emerged in the course of the global financial crisis. We find that the interest rate pass-through was generally complete on impact before the outbreak of the financial crisis, but became significantly distorted in the period thereafter, which hampered the effectiveness of monetary policy. Empirical evidence suggests that the decrease in the interest rate pass-through can be related to a change in the structural parameters characterizing the economies and a substantial increase in the average size of structural shocks. DSGE model simulations show that an increase in the frictions that banks are subject to can explain the decrease in the retail bank interest rate pass-through.     

The timing of exchange rate collapse

Recent episodes of exchange rate collapse have renewed interest in models of speculative attacks. These episodes have been considered by some observers to be inconsistent with “fundamentals” models of attack since there was no prolonged period of policy misalignment and declining reserves, as required by such models. This paper develops a fundamentals model in which collapse is instantaneous at the time of unexpected policy change and/or a change in the expectations of future policy, even for a reserve abundant country.     

Measuring the economic importance of exchange rate exposure

This paper re-examines the nature and the economic significance of the exchange rate to firm value relation using a database of non-financial firms from over 18 countries. Our main contribution is to apply a portfolio approach to investigate the economic importance of exposure. We find that firms with high international sales outperform those with no international sales during periods of large currency depreciations by 0.72% per month, whereas they underperform by 1.10% per month during periods of large currency appreciations. In contrast to the previous literature, our evidence shows that exchange rate movements can have an economically significant impact on firm value.     

On the distributional effects of exchange rate fluctuations

How do exchange rate movements affect different sectors of an economy? We address this question in a simple general equilibrium model, stressing the different exposures of various sectors to foreign competition, an aspect ignored in earlier contributions. The impact of exchange rate shifts is highly heterogenous across sectors. While a depreciation leads to a substantial competitiveness and welfare gain for agents with a high exposure to foreign competition, agents facing mostly domestic competition are adversely affected.     

Exchange rate pass-through and relative prices: An industry-level empirical investigation

In this paper we explore the extent of exchange rate pass-through for the USA, UK and Japan using a post-Bretton Woods industry-level dataset. We investigate how different channels of exchange rate pass-through affect domestic and import prices. Our analysis is suggestive of two channels of transmission and we find considerable variation in the extent of pass-through across industries and countries.     

Cointegration and forward and spot exchange rate regressions

We investigate the relationship between cointegration models of the current spot exchange rate, s_t, and the current forward rate, f_t, and cointegration models of the future spot rate, s_t+1, and f_t and the implications of this relationship for tests of the forward rate unbiasedness hypothesis (FRUH). We show that simple models of cointegration between s_t and f_t imply complicated models of cointegration between s_t+1 and f_t. Consequently, standard methods are often inappropriate for modeling the cointegrated behavior of (s_t+1, f_t)′ and we show that the use of such methods can lead to erroneous inferences regarding the FRUH.     

The impact of monetary policy on the exchange rate: A high frequency exchange rate puzzle in emerging economies

This study investigates the impact of monetary policy shocks on the exchange rates of Brazil, Mexico and Chile. We find that even a focus on 1 day exchange rate changes following policy events – which reduces the potential for reverse causality considerably – fails to lend support for the view that associates unexpected interest rate hikes with immediate appreciations. This lack of empirical backing for the predictions of standard open economy models persists irrespective of whether we use the US Dollar or effective exchange rates, whether changes in the policy rate that were followed by exchange rate interventions are excluded, whether “contaminated” events are dropped from the analysis or whether we allow for non-linearities. We argue that it is difficult to attribute this stronger version of the exchange rate puzzle to fiscal dominance, as unexpected rate increases are not associated with increases in risk premia, and similar results are obtained in the case of Chile – a country that has had the highest possible short-term credit rating since 1995 and a debt/GDP ratio below 10%.     

Exploring different views of exchange rate regime choice

The empirical distinction between de facto and de jure exchange rate regimes raises a number of interesting questions. Which factors may induce a de facto peg? Why do countries enforce a peg but do not announce it? Why do countries “break their promises”? We show that a stable socio-political environment and an efficient political decision-making process are a necessary prerequisite for choosing a peg and sticking to it, challenging the view that sees the exchange rate as a commitment device. Policymakers seem rather concerned with regime sustainability in the face of adverse economic and socio-political fundamentals.     

Option volume,strike distribution,and foreign exchange rate movements

Using Deutschmark currency option data from the Philadelphia Stock Exchange and British pound option data from the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, this article examines the signaling quality of option volume measures on movements in the underlying spot exchange rates. The concept of a volume-weighted strike distribution is proposed. It is demonstrated that measures using the strike distribution are inherently better predictors of both direction and volatility of the exchange rate movements as compared to their more traditional counterparts used in practice, such as the put-call ratio.      

Monetary shocks,exchange rates,and the extensive margin of exports

This paper develops a two-country Dynamic General Equilibrium model to assess the relationship between the real exchange rate and the extensive margin of exports. Exchange rate pass-through to consumer prices governs the relative strength of a demand channel onto the exporting decision of a firm. With incomplete pass-through, a favorable movement in the real exchange rate generates increased export participation and an expansion in the extensive margin of exports. This result is consistent with firm-level studies, and contributes to an ongoing empirical debate as to the importance of changes in export participation over the business cycle.     

汇率价格传递效应理论的发展

传统的汇率价格传递效应理论是建立在一价定律基础上的,认为汇率变动会对进出口价格产生完全的传递效应。但是,大量的实证研究表明,汇率变动引致的进出口价格相应的变动往往是不完全的。关于汇率变动对进出口价格的不完全传递效应,多数学者从微观经济学的视角展开研究,如不完全竞争、价格歧视、沉淀成本、厂商定价策略等;近年来也有一些学者试图从宏观经济学的视角进行解释,如一国通货膨胀环境、货币政策稳定性等。     

人民币汇率变动对中国进口商品价格传递效应的实证研究

通过选取国民经济的24个重点行业,使用从2009~2013年的共60个月度数据为研究样本,采用ADL 模型,对汇率变动对按国民经济分类行业的进口价格的传递弹性系数进行实证研究。结果表明：从长期来看,我国人民币汇率变动与进口价格存在着负相关关系,不同行业和产品的传递弹性存在着较大差异。     

The pricing of exchange rate risk and stock market segmentation: The Canadian case

Empirical evidence by Eun and Resnick (1988), among others, has demonstrated the significance of exchange rate risk in the international asset allocation and they have noted that the risk is nondiversifiable. Yet, exchange rate risk was found by Jorion (1991) to be a risk factor that is not priced in the U.S. stock market. This study reexamines such counterintuitive results using data from the Toronto Stock Exchange. The evidence here weakly supports the pricing of the exchange rate risk. Further, the sample period in this study coincides with Jorion's to ensure that both studies examine the pricing of the exchange rate risk in the same global economic environment. The significant pricing of exchange rate risk in Canada and the insignificant pricing in the U.S. imply the possibility of market segmentation.