The Behavior of the Real Exchange Rate Under Fixed and Floating Exchange Rate Regimes

This article investigates the behavior of real exchange rates under fixed and flexible exchange rates. Using data from both the Bretton Woods and the modern floating periods, we decompose real exchange rate movements into components attributable to supply shocks, real demand shocks, monetary shocks, capital flows shocks, and real oil price shocks. Empirical results show that real demand shocks are an important source of real exchange rate movements under both fixed and flexible rates, while monetary shocks are negligible. Supply and oil price shocks seem to be more important under Bretton Woods, while capital flows shocks seem to explain a relatively higher proportion of real exchange rate movements under the modern floating period.     

Exchange Rate Disconnect in a Standard Open-Economy Macro Model

This paper demonstrates that the well-documented exchange rate disconnect can be explained within traditional exchange rate models. It is shown that even if the underlying fundamentals are invariant across exchange rate regimes, equilibrium real exchange rates are more volatile under flexible nominal exchange rates than under fixed rates. In particular, fixed rates reduce the requisite adjustments of the real exchange rate in response to both nominal and real shocks relative to a floating-rate scenario.     

The role of oil price shocks on China's real exchange rate

This paper investigates to what extent the oil price shock and three other types of underlying macroeconomic shocks impact the trend movements of China's real exchange rate. By constructing a four-dimensional structural VAR model, the results suggest that real oil price shocks would lead to a minor appreciation of the long-term real exchange rate due to China's lesser dependence on imported oil than its trading partners included in the RMB basket peg regime and rigorous government energy regulations. The real shocks, as opposed to nominal shocks, are found to be dominant in the variations of the real exchange rate.     

Proposal for a common currency among rich democracies

This paper proposes the creation of a common currency for the industrialized democracies, notably the United States, the European Union, and Japan. A common currency implies a common monetary policy; institutional arrangements for which are discussed. The rationale rests on the assumption that asymmetrical financial shocks will become more important than asymmetrical real shocks for these large, diversified economies, and that one of the growing sources of financial shocks will be changing expectations about exchange rate movements among national currencies. These financial shocks will in turn disturb real economies, such that flexible exchange rates among major currencies will increasingly become sources of shock more than shock absorbers. Such a common currency would also make it much easier for emerging markets to frame their monetary and exchange rate policies.     

Nontradable Goods and the Real Exchange Rate

How important are nontradable goods and distribution costs to explain real exchange rate dynamics? We answer this question by estimating a general equilibrium model with intermediate and final tradable and nontradable goods. We find that the estimated model can match characteristics of the data that are relevant in international macroeconomics, such as real exchange rate persistence and volatility, and the correlation between the real exchange rate and other variables. The distinction between tradable and nontradable goods is key to understand real exchange rate fluctuations, but the introduction of distribution costs is not. Nontradable sector technology shocks explain about one third of real exchange rate volatility. We also show that, in order to explain the low correlation between the ratio of relative consumption and the real exchange rates across countries, demand shocks are necessary.     

A Quantitative Assessment of the Role of Incomplete Asset Markets on the Dynamics of the Real Exchange Rate

I develop a two-country New Keynesian model with capital accumulation and incomplete international asset markets that provides novel insights on the effect that imperfect international risk-sharing has on international business cycles and RER dynamics. I find that business cycles appear similar whether international asset markets are complete or not when driven by a combination of non-persistent monetary shocks and persistent productivity (TFP) shocks. In turn, international asset market incompleteness has sizeable effects if (persistent) investment-specific technology (IST) shocks are a main driver of business cycles. I also show that the model with incomplete international asset markets can approximate the RER volatility and persistence observed in the data, for instance, if IST shocks are near-unit-root. Hence, I conclude that the nature of shocks, the extent of financial integration across countries and the existing limitations on asset trading are central to understand the dynamics of the real exchange rate and the endogenous international transmission over the business cycles.     

Monetary Shocks and the Fundamental Determinants of the Real Exchange Rate under the Hong Kong Currency Board

To assess the claim that flexible markets render monetary policy unimportant under the currency board, we test the impact of monetary shocks on Hong Kong's real exchange rate. Using vector autoregressions, we find persistent effects of monetary shocks on the real exchange rate, implying money is not neutral in Hong Kong. We then estimate the equilibrium real exchange rate, employing the definition developed by Rogoff-Obstfeld-Stein. The divergence between the observed and equilibrium rates is clearly stationary throughout the 1980s, but after a key policy shift in 1991 that divergence becomes non-stationary. We conclude that Hong Kong's real exchange rate moved away from the real fundamentals in the latter period.     

An Empirical Analysis on Capital Flows: The Case of Korea and Mexico

This paper discusses causes of capital flows in Korea and Mexico. Both countries received substantial amounts of foreign capital in the late 1980s and early 1990s. International capital helped these countries achieve a higher standard of living and faster economic growth. However, undesirable macroeconomic effects such as appreciation of real exchange rate and widening current account deficits usually accompany foreign capital inflows. The vector autoregressive (VAR) method is applied to investigate the underlying shocks causing the capital inflows. The main findings are that the U.S. business cycle and shocks to foreign interest rates account for more than 50% of capital inflows to both countries in the past two decades.     

Real exchange rate misalignment and business cycle fluctuations in the Asia-Pacific

Real exchange rate (RER) misalignment, which is the deviation between the actual real exchange rate from its equilibrium, occurs frequently among developing countries. Studies have shown that RER misalignment may have negative economic implications, such as a decline in economic growth, exports, and export diversification and an increased risk of currency crises and political instability. Using quarterly data for 22 sample countries from 1990 to 2018, this paper investigates the impact of RER misalignment on business cycles in the Asia-Pacific by employing a panel vector autoregression involving consumer price index (CPI) inflation, output gap, short-term interest rates, and RER misalignment. We find that RER overvaluation may reduce CPI inflation and short-term interest rates. We also find that the Asia-Pacific region is highly heterogeneous in that the output gaps of some countries, particularly from the Southeast Asian region, are more susceptible to RER misalignment shocks.     

中美两国汇率波动与相对经济周期的联动性——基于频谱分析的研究

本文指出人民币兑美元实际汇率波动可能与中美两国间相对经济周期具有紧密的联动性,为此,本文首先构造了一个理论模型对两国间实际汇率波动与相对经济周期关联的存在性进行了论证,随后应用频谱分析技术对1994:Q1至2011:Q4人民币兑美元实际汇率波动与中美相对经济周期的联动性进行了实证检验。主要的结论有两个,一是在样本时段内中美相对经济周期领先于人民币兑美元实际汇率的波动,二是在4年左右一个波动周期的频域内二者的联动性最高。以上结论说明中美相对经济周期是人民币兑美元汇率波动的决定因素,而调整人民币兑美元汇率并不能改变中美两国经济的失衡关系。     

Monetary regime choice in Singapore: Would a Taylor rule outperform exchange-rate management?

A DSGE–VAR approach was adopted to examine the managed exchange-rate system at work in Singapore and to ask if the country had any reason to fear floating the exchange rate and adopting a Taylor rule. The results showed that, in terms of overall inflation volatility, the exchange rate rule had a comparative advantage over the Taylor rule when export-price shocks were the major sources of real volatility while a Taylor rule was preferable when domestic productivity shocks were dominant. The exchange-rate rule also dominated the Taylor rule for reducing inflation persistence.     

The Effects of Fiscal Policy in a Small Open Economy with a Fixed Exchange Rate

We study the empirical effects of fiscal policy in Denmark since the adoption of a fixed exchange rate policy in 1982. Denmark’s fixed exchange rate implies that the nominal interest rate remains fixed after a fiscal expansion, facilitating a substantial impact of the fiscal stimulus on the real economy. On the other hand, the large degree of openness of the Danish economy means that a sizeable share of the fiscal stimulus will be directed towards imported goods. Our results suggest that the ‘monetary accomodation channel’ dominates the ‘leakage effect’ in the short run. We demonstrate that fiscal stimulus has a rather large impact on economic activity in the very short run, with a government spending multiplier of 1.1 on impact in our preferred specification. We also find that the effects of fiscal stimulus are rather short-lived in Denmark, with the effect on output becoming insignificant after around two years. The fiscal multiplier is above 1 only in the first quarter, and drops to 0.6 one year after the shock. We also find that in the short run, the government spending multiplier is larger than the tax multiplier. Finally, we demonstrate that exogenous shocks to government spending account for less than 10 % of the movements in output over the business cycle in Denmark.     

Changes in misalignment of the Korean won: Towards a flexible exchange rate regime

This paper investigates whether the adoption of a more floating exchange rate regime with inflation targeting has improved the vulnerability of the exchange rate, by looking at the Korean case. Using the NATREX model, I estimate the equilibrium real exchange rate of the Won and its misalignment. The unit‐root test for misalignment and the unrestrictive vector autoregressive (VAR) impulse response function test show that under a more flexible exchange rate regime, the vulnerability of the exchange rate regime to external shocks has declined.     

SHORT‐RUN AND LONG‐RUN DETERMINANTS OF THE REAL EXCHANGE RATE IN MEXICO

This paper explores the real exchange rate behavior in Mexico from 1960 until 2005. Since the empirical analysis reveals that the real exchange rate is not mean reverting, we propose that economic fundamental variables affect its evolution in the long run. Therefore, based on equilibrium exchange rate paradigms, we propose a simple model of real exchange rate determination, which includes the relative GDP per capita, the real interest rates, and the net foreign assets over a long period of time. Our analysis also considers the dynamic adjustment in response to shocks through impulse response functions derived from the multivariate vector autoregressive (VAR) model.     

Postwar business cycles in Japan: A quest for the right explanation

This paper explores the nature of postwar business cycles in Japan. Our basic strategy is to study different production behaviors of various manufacturing industries over business cycles. We are particularly interested in the problems of whether only monetary shocks are important and, if not, what kind of real shocks are important. We conclude that purely monetary theory is inadequate, and that construction activities were major causes of aggregate fluctuations in the pre-first oil shock period of rapid growth. We also present some evidence suggesting that real business cycle theory is implausible.     

Sources of Purchasing Power Disparities between the G3 Economies

Recent theoretical and empirical research in international macroeconomics has rediscovered the problem of purchasing power parity (PPP). Empirically, PPP is a bad approximation of both the short-term and medium-term properties of the data. Economists have had difficulties in explaining the persistent misalignments of real exchange rates, but new empirical research by Clarida and Galí (1995), Carnegie Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Vol. 41 suggested that much of these real exchange rate movements are due to relative demand shocks. The present paper challenges this view by using an extended version of their structural vector autoregressive (SVAR) model in order to identify a larger number of real shocks (labor supply, productivity, and aggregate demand) and nominal shocks (money demand and money supply). It is found that while some of their results go through in our extended framework, there is serious doubt with respect to the appropriateness of labeling those shocks which drive real exchange rates as aggregate demand disturbances.J. Japan Int. Econ.December 1997,11(4), pp. 548–583. Universität Bonn, Lennéstrasse 43, 53113 Bonn, Germany and CEPR.     

Financial market integration,exchange rate policy,and the dynamics of business and employment in Korea

We study the consequences of different degrees of international financial market integration and exchange rate policies in a calibrated, medium-scale model of the Korean economy. The model features endogenous producer entry into domestic and export markets and search-and-matching frictions in labor markets. This allows us to highlight the consequences of financial integration and the exchange rate regime for the dynamics of business creation and unemployment. We show that, under flexible exchange rates, access to international financial markets increases the volatility of both business creation and the number of exporting plants, but the effects on employment volatility are more modest. Pegging the exchange rate can have unfavorable consequences for the effects of terms of trade appreciation, but more financial integration is beneficial under a peg if the economy is subject to both productivity and terms of trade shocks. The combination of a floating exchange rate and internationally complete markets would be the best scenario for Korea among those we focus on.     

SYNCHRONISATION BETWEEN SOUTH AFRICA AND THE U.S.: A STRUCTURAL DYNAMIC FACTOR ANALYSIS

This paper studies the synchronisation of the South African and the US cycles and transmission channels through which supply and demand shocks from the US affect economic activity in South Africa in a structural dynamic factor model framework. We find, using the full-sample period, US supply shocks are transmitted to South Africa through business confidence and imports of goods and services; while US demand shocks are transmitted via interest rates, stock prices, exports of goods and services, and real effective exchange rates. Second, there is a decrease in integration over time translated by a drop in synchronisation of cycles. The impact of an increase in comovement of GDP is outweighed by the structural reforms initiated by the government after the end of apartheid. Finally, the idiosyncratic component still plays an important role in the South African economy.     

Transmission mechanisms of real stochastic shocks in a small open economy

We offer a qualitative evaluation of the transmission mechanisms of two real shocks, a productivity shock and a government expenditure shock in Walrasian business cycle models. The analysis is developed in a monetary small open economy business cycle model, a set-up general enough to study the effects of the two shocks on both real and nominal variables. Qualitative and graphical displays indicate properties of Real Business Cycles that are able to reproduce observed cyclical patterns, independently of the calibration used for different economies. These qualitative findings match the quantitative results found in the literature, and rationalize some disparity findings (such as the cyclicity pattern of prices) and failures (such as the Dunlop–Tarshis observation). We suggest that understanding the underlying qualitative intuitions of these models may be of great help in tackling new puzzles in this area.     

Trade openness, real exchange rates and job reallocation: evidence from Belgium

This paper investigates the impact of real exchange rate movements on job reallocation at the industry level. The analysis focuses on the manufacturing sector of Belgium, using data for 82 NACE 3-digit industries, over the time span 1996–2002. I find that real exchange rate changes do have a significant impact on job flows, and that this impact is magnified by increasing levels of trade exposure. In particular, a real appreciation is found to lower net employment growth through higher job destruction, while job creation is not significantly affected. These results are in line with previous empirical evidence on the United States, and differ from earlier findings for France and Germany, where the adjustment to real exchange rate shocks has been found to occur mainly through the job creation margin. I suggest that these differences may be explained by the fact that Belgium is a small open economy.