Does Real Exchange Rate Depreciation Boost Capital Accumulation? An Intertemporal Analysis

This paper examines the investment‐enhancing effect of real exchange rate (RER) depreciation in a two‐sector small open economy model where a representative firm in the tradable sector maximises its discounted profit over an infinite planning period. In this framework, a one‐time, permanent, unanticipated depreciation in the RER leads to a higher steady‐state level of capital stock and investment. This consequently increases the optimal investment rate associated with an arbitrary level of capital stock as the saddle path shifts upwards. In the benchmark calibration, the investment‐enhancing effect of RER depreciation is sizeable. One per cent depreciation in the RER leads to an increase of 0.4444 per cent in the rate of capital accumulation.     

Effect of China’s Real Exchange Rate Appreciation in the Next Decade: A Recursive Dynamic CGE Analysis

Although the renminbi has appreciated over 30% against the US dollar since China launched exchange rate reform in the mid of 2005, the US Treasury Department still claims that the renminbi remains “significantly undervalued”. If that is true, how to adjust the currency effectively and rebalance the current account are challenges for the Chinese government. This paper explores the effect of alternative adjustments of China’s real exchange rate. Unlike previous simulation designs, this paper considers the formation mechanism of the real exchange rate. By assuming the same change in factor price during different periods and by using the recursive dynamic computable general equilibrium model, two different scenarios are simulated against the baseline. One scenario adjusts the macro-structural imbalance by decreasing the gross national savings rate in China, and the other adjusts the micro-structural imbalance by increasing the real wage rate of Chinese labor. The external imbalance is improved by both internal structural adjustments in the long term. The effect of macro-adjustment is more significant than the micro-adjustment. A real appreciation will be sufficient for China to improve its terms of trade and to change the export-oriented model into the demand-oriented model of development in the next decade.     

Does Regime Choice Affect Exchange Rate Volatility-Economic Growth Link? An Application of Panel-VAR Approach

In recent years, numerous studies demonstrated that the effect of exchange rate regimes on economic growth is influenced by several factors. However, the literature rarely takes into account the possible costs associated with improving institutional quality on the choice of exchange systems and the analysis of the effects of shocks in the case of each type of regime. Throughout this research, we analyze the extent of bidirectional shocks according to each regime and compare the shock effects accordingly. The results show that the real exchange rate is less volatile and the shock effect is lower in countries that adopt a fixed exchange rate regime while the exchange rate is more volatile and the shock is higher in countries that adopt a flexible exchange rate regime. To show the effect and persistence of shocks, we carried out a Panel-VAR regression completed by impulse response functions, VAR decomposition and Granger causality tests for 20 countries adopting the first type of exchange regime compared with 20 countries practicing an alternative exchange rate regime in the period from 1996 to 2012.     

Is Exchange Rate Volatility Symmetric to Oil Price Volatility? An Investigation for India

Journal of Quantitative Economics - The studies involving finding a relation between oil prices and the exchange rate have often looked the relationship when the oil price was rising. Will the...     

The Long-Drawn Process of reform of the Exchange Rate Regime and the Evolution of China’s Exchange Rate Policy

ABSTRACT

An inflexible exchange rate not only brings the traditional problem of impossible trinity but also contributes to the formation of China’s irrational international balance of payments structure characterized by the so-called twin surpluses (current account and capital account surpluses). As a result, though China has some 2 trillion USD net foreign assets, it runs investment income deficits for more than a decade. Furthermore, when the RMB is under appreciation pressure, the inflexibility brings about inflows of hot money. When the RMB is under depreciation pressure, the inflexibility facilitates the unwinding of carry trade and capital flights. On the whole, China is too cautious in reforming its exchange rate regime. Instead of designing various cumbersome central parity rate-setting rules, China should make up its mind to float the RMB as soon as possible.     

Time-Varying Fundamentals of the Euro–Dollar Exchange Rate

Abstract

This study examines changes in the impact of the economic fundamentals on the euro–dollar exchange rate. First, the monetary model is augmented with the equity markets and the model is estimated in its structural form. Second, the time-varying impacts of the long-run fundamentals representing equilibrium in different markets on the euro–dollar exchange rate are examined using Kalman filtering. The time-varying structural model indicated that the relative importance of the different fundamentals was not equal and the impact of the fundamentals was time-dependent.     

Analysis on the Option of RMB Exchange Rate Regime

This paper analyses four effects of pegging exchange rate regime： effects on government policymaking, nominal anchor, domestic currency appreciation expectation, and currericy speculative attacks. Based on this, the paper concludes that China should give up RMB pegging exchange rate regime at present, carry out RMB floating exchange rate regime in the long term and RMB exchange rate target zone regime in the mid and short term.     

The Exchange Rate: A Shock Absorber or Source of Shocks in Turkey?

This study investigates the role of the exchange rate as shock-absorber as opposed to a source of its own shocks in Turkey during the period from 1990 to 2009 by employing a structural VAR framework with long-run and short-run restrictions. We find that the economic shocks have predominantly been asymmetric relative to one of the largest trading partner, the US. Our results provide evidence of the fact that while the major source of variability in exchange rates in the pre-2001 crisis period is mainly nominal shocks, a large proportion of the exchange rate variability can be attributed to supply and demand shocks in the post-2001 crisis period. This suggets that, rather than reacting to shocks to the foreign exchange market, such as shifts in risk premia, the exchange rate moves mainly in response to the real shocks during the post-2001 crisis period. Hence, there is a sizeable role for exchange rate stabilization during this period, absorbing those shocks and therefore requiring opposed monetary policy responses.     

The Monetary Approach to the Exchange Rate Determination for a “Petrocurrency”: The Case of Norwegian Krone

This paper, by following vector error correction modeling, empirically investigates some of the popular monetary models of the NOK/USD rate. The empirical results suggest that there is some scope for the monetary approach to explain the development of the NOK/USD during the period from 1997 to 2008. The coefficients in the co-integration equation of both money and output differentials are statistically significant and consistent with any of the forms of the monetary models. Moreover, empirical evidence for the proportionality between the exchange rate and relative money is provided. Our findings are robust across different measures of inflation expectations. Although there is no clear evidence regarding the exact version of the monetary model, the estimated unrestricted error correction models can fit the actual NOK/USD exchange rate. Finally, the short-term dynamics of the exchange rate are significantly affected by changes in crude oil prices.     

Are the Methods of the Net Present Value Rate and Net Annual Value Rate the Effective Scheme Comparison Methods

As for the dispute about the best-choosing method of mutually-exclusive scheme and index selection, this text proves that there is an error to make a point that using net present value rate or net annual value rate, the most scientific and effective method is chain-system differential analysis and the most short-cutting method is the method of net annual value, to select the NA V maximum scheme.     

China＇s Exchange Rate System——A Policy Perspective

Like most developing countries, China has been adopting a multiple exchange rate regime in its attempt to maintain control and order while liberalizing transactions in the sphere of trade, non-trade and crossborder fund flows. From a very rigid, highly centralized regime in 1979, China has by now advanced to a relatively flexible system under which the official rate, the swap rate, and the ＂free＂ market rate coexist. The tight control of international transfer of funds has also been progressively relaxed, as different parties gain increasing freedom to acquire foreign exchange. The Chinese economy has been reasonably stable during the Asian financial crisis. Although China maintains the exchange rate stability, in near future a real appreciation of the RMB must be necessary element in global adjustment. More flexible exchange rate will give more advantages for Chinese economy.     

A possible explanation of the ‘Exchange Rate Disconnect Puzzle’: a common solution to three macroeconomic puzzles?

Meese and Rogoff (1983) and subsequent studies find that economic fundamentals are apparently not able to explain exchange rate movements, but we argue that this so-called ‘Exchange Rate Disconnect Puzzle’ arose because researchers such as Meese and Rogoff (1983) did not use the right fundamentals and because they did not allow for the forward-looking nature of exchange rate determination. Further, because they apparently were not aware that financial markets by themselves could not equalize interest rates across countries, they did not properly appreciate that the exchange rate is strongly influenced by agents’ expectations of aggregated differences in local returns. Thus, we believe that the same underlying explanation provided by Ford (2015) and Ford and Horioka (2016a, 2016b) for the Feldstein-Horioka (1980) Puzzle and the PPP Puzzle – namely that financial markets alone cannot achieve net transfers of financial capital and cannot equalize real interest rates across countries – also helps explain why previous attempts to connect changes in the exchange rate to economic fundamentals have not been successful and so can also be said to contribute to solving the Exchange Rate Disconnect Puzzle.     

Is Latin America Catching Up? A Time‐Series Approach

Most Latin American economies ended the twentieth century further behind the United States (in terms of productivity) than they had been in 1950. We investigate whether this reflects the effect of occasional economic setbacks or a systematic tendency to fall behind the United States. This is done using a time‐series approach that allows for up to two structural breaks in a series. We find evidence that relative productivity is a (broken) trend‐stationary process for most of the 18 countries considered but that only one, Chile, shows evidence of catching up with the United States at the century’s close.     

Is There an Austrian Approach to Transition?

This paper discusses the meaning of the term transition and its implications for policy making. It is suggested that an Austrian view would enhance a better understanding of what has been happening in Central and Eastern Europe in the past decade. Within this framework, the analysis should be based on three criteria: acquisition of knowledge, individual responsibility, free entry. It concludes that future transition analysis should devote more attention to the way a number of subjectivistic features drive institutional change, as well as to the features of the new opportunity sets made available to individuals.     

Are Flexible Exchange Rate Regimes more Volatile? Panel GARCH Evidence for the G7 and Latin America

This paper investigates empirically the relationship between exchange rate (ER) regimes and volatility of real exchange rate depreciation (RERD), comparing the G7 and 17 Latin American (LA17) countries, during 1970–2010. We estimate a panel autoregressive model with generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity (GARCH) errors and regime‐specific effects on both the conditional mean and conditional variance. For the G7, we find that, relative to the fixed ER regime, only the freely floating regime shows higher RERD volatility; under the managed floating regime the RERD is equally volatile and under the crawling peg it is actually less volatile. Instead, in the case of the LA17, more flexible ER regimes are associated with more volatile RERD rates, with higher volatility under the managed floating regime than under the crawling peg and with extremely high volatility under the “freely falling” ER regime.     

The Political Cause of the Movement of RMB Exchange Rate：A Research Based on the Spillover Effects of US Political Cycle

Movement of the renminbi (RMB) exchange rate is not only affected by economic factors, but also by political factors home and aboard. This paper analyzes the transmission mechanism of political cycles on the RMB exchange rate first, and then sets up a “political cycle spillover effect model” followed by an empirical analysis. We find that: (1) the US political cycle has a direct effect on the RMB exchange rate in the short run, which is mainly transmitted by capital flows and China’s exchange rate policy control; (2) the RMB exchange rate changes periodically in accordance with the US presidential election and midterm election cycle, with the appreciation ratio significantly lower in the first year of the election cycle, while significantly higher in the year after the midterm election; (3) The effect of the political cycle will not be affected by which party holds power, though it will be affected if the president and parliament are ruled by the same party. This paper not only extends the research of the influencing factors of the RMB exchange rate to the political field, but also sets up a use theoretical model to analyze the impact of political issues on the RMB exchange rate, providing a new perspective to fully understand the external environment of RMB exchange rate reform.     

The Appreciation Pressure on RMB Yuan and the Adjustment of RMB Exchange Rate Policy

China has maintained RMB exchange rate nearly unchanged since 1998. However, with the relaxation of capital control, a crawling peg, a more flexible RMB exchange rate regime, is inevitable. Based on improving the current formation mechanism of RMB exchange rate, Chinese government could widen the floating band around the central parity; in the long run, switching the peg from USD alone to a basket of currencies may be a better choice.     

Capital Flows and Exchange Rate Volatility in India: How Crucial Are Reserves?

This paper tests if the adequacy of reserves helps reduce exchange rate volatility in an environment of financial globalization, market‐determined exchange rate and macroeconomic imbalances. It exploits the difference in the period after 2010 when India did not accumulate reserves but faced higher capital flow pressures, relative to a previous managed‐float period marked by significant absorption of surplus capital flows. Along with other determinants, the sensitivity of rupee volatility is examined. The paper finds that adequate reserve holdings significantly reduce exchange rate volatility irrespective of the exchange rate regime; the effect is more through influence upon market sentiment and confidence than actual intervention. It contributes to existing evidence on the role of reserves in mitigating exchange rate volatility amid capital flow swings and offers insights into the policy environment depicted in the trilemma.