Re‐entering Europe: Does European Union candidacy boost foreign direct investment?

This study examines the ability of the Central and Eastern European countries to attract foreign direct investment during the first decade of transition. After considering a model of profit maximizing firms, we undertake an empirical investigation of the factors that determine multinational firms’ location decisions within Europe. We find empirical support for the traditional market size and cost factors. In addition, we examine the effect of key European Union announcements regarding the accession process. Results indicate that the announcements had statistically significant and quantitatively important effects on foreign direct investment in the Central and Eastern European candidate countries.     

The determinants of foreign direct investment into European transition economies

Using a panel dataset of bilateral flows of foreign direct investment (FDI), we study the determinants of FDI from Western countries, mainly in the European Union (EU), to Central and Eastern European ones. We find the most important influences to be unit labor costs, gravity factors, market size, and proximity. Interestingly, host country risk proves not to be a significant determinant. Our empirical work also indicates that announcements about EU Accession proposals have an impact on FDI for the future member countries. Journal of Comparative Economics 32 (4) (2004) 775–787.     

The EU attitude to unilateral euroization: Misunderstandings,real concerns and sub‐optimal admission criteria

European Union objections to unilateral euroization by applicant countries are categorized as either a misunderstanding of what euroization entails or as justified concern, which should be alleviated by candidates wishing to euroize. Some ways in which candidates can alleviate concerns are discussed, as well as possible adjustments to the Maastricht criteria which might better protect both sides' interests. The paper concludes that the EU would benefit if it accepted unilateral euroization by applicants. JEL classification: E42, F33, F42, P24.     

Distance in time between transition economies and the European Union

The time distance methodology used offers a new perspective to the problem, an additional statistical measure, and a presentation tool for policy analysis and debate readily understood by policy makers, media and general public. Disparity between the analysed transition economies and EU countries is considerably smaller for other indicators than for GDP per capita. Compared with Ireland, Portugal and Greece Slovenia was in 1995 in 13 cases behind (but time lag of Slovenia never exceeded 10 years) and in 13 cases ahead of them. Sicherl (1997a) discusses application of S-distance to time series regressions, models, forecasting and monitoring. First version received: October 1995/final version received: April 1998     

Monetary policy synchronization in the ASEAN-5 region: an exchange rate perspective

In light of the long-standing vision of economic and monetary integration in the ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) region and the importance of coordinating monetary policies to achieve it, the objective of this article is to assess the monetary policy synchronization among the founding members of the ASEAN, that is, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. Due to the importance of exchange rate movements to monetary policies, we approach this issue from a currency exchange rate perspective. Specifically, multivariate trend–cycle decomposition is employed to investigate common trends and common cycles among the exchange rates of these countries during the period 1976–2012. Our analysis reveals that the real exchange rates of Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand share common cycles in the short term and have common trends in the long term, but the Indonesian currency does not share these relationships. Thus, our results augur well for the synchronization of monetary policies among Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. In contrast, the relatively turbulent dynamics of the Indonesian rupiah evident in frequent bouts of stark depreciation separated by periods of steady depreciation over the past three decades raise questions regarding the readiness of Indonesia for participating in a monetary alliance with the ASEAN-4 nations.     

The transmission of euro area monetary policy to financially euroized countries

This paper provides a comprehensive analysis of the interest rate pass-through of euro area monetary policy to retail rates outside the euro area, contributing to the literature on the consequences of unofficial financial euroization and on the transmission channels of monetary policy spillovers. The results suggest that in the long run, more than the one-third of all euro retail rates in euroized countries of central, eastern, and south-eastern Europe is linked to the euro area shadow rate. Compared with euro area monetary policy, the share of cointegration of the domestic monetary policy rate is on average lower, suggesting that domestic central banks in euroized countries with independent monetary policy can only partially control the “euro part” of the interest rate channel. Furthermore, euro area monetary policy shocks are fast and persistently transmitted into euro retail rates outside the euro area, which constitutes an additional channel of international shock transmission.     

Exchange Rate Movements and Employment Growth: An OCA Assessment of the CEE Economies

According to the traditional optimum currency area approach, not much will be lost from a very hard peg to a currency union if there has been little reason for variations in the exchange rate in the past. This paper takes a different approach and highlights the fact that high exchange rate volatility may also signal high costs for labor markets. The impact of exchange rate volatility on labor markets in the CEECs is analyzed, revealing that volatility vis-à-vis the euro significantly lowers employment growth. Hence, eliminating exchange rate volatility could be considered a substitute for removing employment protection legislation.     

Exchange rate pass-through: The case of China

This paper studies the degree of the exchange rate pass-through (ERPT) to import and consumer prices in China with both the ratio of China’s imports to GDP and domestic prices of China’s main trade partners going up. Statistic results show that the degree of ERPT is somehow less than the degree of marginal cost plus mark-up pass-through of exporters, and econometric analyses reach the same conclusion. Besides, the ERPT to import prices is found to be high while the ERPT to CPI is low owing to some factors that obstruct the import prices pass-through channel to domestic CPI. But this situation has been changing significantly since August 2005. Thus, a more flexible exchange rate system is needed for China to absorb the price shock from aboard efficiently.     

The demand for money and the real exchange rate misalignments in emerging European countries: A nonlinear approach

This paper investigates the extent to which domestic and foreign money balances in emerging European countries are influenced by foreign exchange considerations. A well-specified and stable relationship between real money demand and the exchange rate can be perceived as an important part of a successful monetary policy. This study examines the long-run determinants of real exchange rates (RERs) associated with the behavioral equilibrium exchange rate (BEER) approach and identifies currency misalignments in these countries. The misalignment is later used to test the nonlinear behavior of the demand for money. The results indicate that the RER misalignments have a significant impact on domestic money demand. When the currencies are overvalued, there is a reduction in domestic money demand, and when they are undervalued, there is an increase in domestic money demand. Furthermore, it can be concluded that overvaluation causes an increase in foreign money demand indicating a shift of preference from domestic to foreign currency.     

Poland's Accession to the European Union: Demand for Protection of Selected Sensitive Products

This paper analyses the expected changes in external tariffs and imports in Poland after accession to the European Union. We find that around 14% of all manufacturing commodity groups in the Harmonised System will experience tariff reductions of over 10 percentage points, while for agricultural goods tariff comparisons are complicated by very different tariff systems and may be overrated, since applied tariffs are often lower than those legislated. Based on gravity estimates we also find onlly few relatively narrowly defined commodities will experience import growth rates of above 20%. More widely defined sensitive commodities are subject to much smaller but still important import growth     

Prices and interest rate behavior in the European Monetary Union: The first 18 months

New ideas on the role of central banks have been exposed in recent years. This paper studies the evolution of the consumer price index and the treasury bill rate in the 11 countries of the European Union that have adopted the euro to see if it could be considered to be consistent with a unified economic policy, as directed by the European Central Bank. This evolution is analyzed during the first year and a half of the existence of the euro.     

Time Inconsistency and the Exchange Rate Channel of Monetary Policy

This paper analyses time–inconsistency problems related to the exchange rate channel of monetary policy. Within a simple open–economy macroeconomic model, where the exchange rate is the only forward–looking variable, we show that a difference emerges between optimal policy under discretion and under commitment. Moreover, the nature of the time–inconsistency problem resembles that resulting from standard New Keynesian models: when cost–push shocks occur, the exchange rate channel gives rise to excessive output stabilisation and insufficient inertia in monetary policy under a discretionary policy.
JEL classification : E 42; E 52; E 61     

人民币汇率制度的现实选择--基于中印情况比较的分析

一国所选择的汇率制度,应是既能适应经济发展的要求,又能促进经济的协调运行。印度与中国具有大致相同的有关汇率制度变革需求的现实背景,但是印度货币当局在实施有管理的浮动汇率制度中,保持了卢比汇率的基本稳定,值得我们借鉴。目前,中国具有支撑人民币强势的坚实基础。人民币汇率制度变迁应该根据中国在全球金融经济链条中的民族利益而不是屈从于某些大国政治利益而确定。     

The European refugee crisis and the natural rate of output

The European Commission follows a harmonized approach for calculating structural (potential) output for EU member states that takes into account labour as an important ingredient. This article shows how the recent huge migrants’ inflow to Europe affects trend output. Due to the fact that the immigrants immediately increase the working population but effectively do not enter the labour market, we illustrate that the potential output is potentially upward biased without any corrections. Taking Germany as an example, we find that the average medium-term potential growth rate is lower if the migration flow is modelled adequately compared to results based on the unadjusted European Commission procedure.     

The Dilemmas of Tax Coordination in the Enlarged European Union

This study evaluates the economic effects of corporate tax coordinationin the enlarged European Union (EU) using a computable generalequilibrium model. Our main findings are as follows: (i) Corporatetax coordination can yield modest aggregate welfare gains. The2004 enlargement of the EU has increased the potential gainsfrom tax harmonization, provided corporate tax rates and taxbases are harmonized at their unweighted averages. (ii) Allscenarios for coordination leave some EU Member States as winnersand others as losers. An agreement on tax coordination is thereforelikely to require elaborate compensation mechanisms. (iii) Thelarge and diverse country effects suggest that Enhanced Cooperationfor a subset of the Member States may be the most likely routetowards tax coordination. (iv) Identifying winners and losersfrom coordination for the purpose of a compensation mechanismmay be problematic, since countries experiencing gains in GDPand welfare tend to lose tax revenues, and vice versa. (JELcodes: H25, H73, H87)     

汇率制度改革对人民币均衡汇率调整速度的影响

本文首先运用行为均衡汇率模型(BEER)和协整理论,分别测算1994年~2006年和1994年~2005年第2季度的人民币均衡汇率水平,得到相关变量的协整关系式和误差修正模型。笔者通过比较发现:2005年7月21日起,我国实行的新汇率制度可以显著加快汇率回到均衡水平的速度,调整速度从过去每季度调整0.21增加到现在的每季度调整0.35,这说明我国这次汇率制度改革是十分成功的,可以显著加快人民币汇率回到均衡水平的步伐。     

人民币汇率制度选择与转型研究

本文探讨了人民币汇率制度的选择与转型安排．以及参考汇率制度选择需要考虑的因素,分析了我国汇率制度的静态选择、动态选择和演变过程,提出了人民币汇率制度转型的“区间爬行反复趋稳”过程。     

人民币汇率管理技术研究

新的人民币汇率形成机制对汇率管理提出了更高的技术要求。人民于汇率管理技术作为一种重要的生产力,为人民币汇率管理提供了重要的操作技巧和技术支持。创新和发展人民币汇率管理技术,有利于进一步提高人民币汇率管理效率和外汇资源配置效率。人民币汇率管理技术的变近大致经历了萌芽阶段、起步阶段、徘徊阶段和快速发展4个时期;人民币汇率管理技术的创新内容包括人民币汇率机制管理技术、弹性管理技术、风险管理技术和信息管理技术等;人民币汇率管理技术的未来发展方向应由“原始型、初级型、封闭型、粗放型、僵化型”向“现代型、市场型、开放型、集约型、创新型”转变。同时,针对人民币汇率管理技术发展中的制约因素,还要注意发展策略的选择,如培育有效的外汇专场主体．加强汇率基础设施建设,营造汇率生态环境,培养金融技术人才等。     

从制度变迁看人民币汇率的走势及改革趋势

近期人民币是否升值成了热点问题。从新制度经济学角度来看，人民币汇率在某个特定的时期应当升值还是保持稳定抑或贬值并不重要，重大的在于实现人民币汇率制度及其汇率机制的合理化。