Equity Capital Flows and Demand for REITs

REITs are attractive to investors due to their unique characteristics such as high dividend yields, low correlation with common stocks, and a potential hedge against inflation. Thus the market demand curve of REIT equities may not be horizontal. This paper examines the shape of the market demand curve for REIT equities by employing REIT equity capital flows as a proxy for REIT aggregate demand. Our results do not support a downward demand curve for REIT equities. That is, we do not find evidence for the price-pressure effect in REIT returns. Instead, we find it is REIT returns that affect REIT equity capital flows rather than REIT equity flows that affect REIT returns. The results are consistent when we allow for the presence of market fundamental variables in our analysis. In addition, a variance decomposition analysis suggests that REIT equity capital flows do not cause revisions in expected cash flows (dividends) that are strong enough to impact REIT returns. Thus our findings are consistent with implications that the market demand curve for REIT equities is horizontal.     

Portfolio Capital Flows in Thailand: A Bayesian Model Averaging Approach

We study the gross and net terms of portfolio capital flows by examining their determinants. Through the application of the Bayesian model averaging method, the determinants are evaluated by a set of models instead of a single specification. Our findings show that the magnitude of both gross equity and gross debt flows are large, relative to their net terms. Equity inflows and outflows are quite symmetric with similar determinants; debt inflows and outflows are less symmetric. The paper provides partial evidence to support the importance of both internal and external factors as determinants of capital flows.     

Evolution of Bilateral Capital Flows to Developing Countries at Intensive and Extensive Margins

Motivated by the rise in capital flows to low‐income countries (LICs), we examine the nature of these flows and the factors affecting foreign investors' decision. Recognizing the presence of fixed investment costs, we analyze capital flows at both intensive and extensive margins. To fix ideas, we resort to the gravity literature for the estimating relationships which we embed into a two‐tier econometric framework with cross‐sectional dependence. Our main finding is that market entry costs are statistically and economically very detrimental to LICs. We also obtain the gravity‐type relationship for the destination income unconditionally but not after conditioning on relevant variables, as well as establish labor productivity as a robust attractor of capital inflows.     

Exchange Rates and Capital Flows

This paper explores the ability of portfolio and foreign direct investment flows to track movements in the euro and the yen against the dollar. Net portfolio flows from the euro area into US stocks – possibly reflecting differences in expected productivity growth – track movements in the euro against the dollar closely. Net FDI flows, which capture the recent burst in cross‐border M&A activity, appear less important in tracking movements in the euro‐dollar rate, possibly because many M&A transactions consist of share swaps. Movements in the yen versus the dollar remain more closely tied to conventional variables such as the current account and interest differential.     

Capital Cash Flows,APV and Valuation

This paper examines three different methods of valuing companies and projects: the adjusted present value (APV), capital cash flows (CCF) and weighted average cost of capital (WACC) methods. It develops the appropriate WACC and beta leveraging formulae appropriate for each valuation model, so that given a particular valuation model the correct APV and CCF values can be determined from the WACC value and vice versa. Further it goes on to show when the perpetuity formulae give poor estimates of the value of individual cash flows, even though the overall values are correct. The paper cautions that the APV and CCF models require more information than is currently known, such as the value of the corporate use of debt, and consequently can give misleading results, particularly in sensitivity analyses.     

Capital Flows,Sterilization, and Macro-Prudential Policy in China

This article estimates the sterilization coefficients of the subcomponents of reserves in China over time with recursive regressions. The results suggest that People’s Bank of China tended to sterilize the more fluctuating components of capital inflows: FDI inflows received little attention, while non-FDI and current account had been heavily sterilized. After including the subcomponents of non-FDI into the empirical model, the results demonstrate that issuing bonds was successful in sterilization intervention till 2007Q2, while the effectiveness of sterilization policies was limited since then, resulting in an increase in monetary supply. The excessive money did not flow into the circulation and had limited effects on stimulating the real economy.     

Global Economic Divergence and Portfolio Capital Flows to Emerging Markets

This paper studies the role of global and regional variations in economic activity and policy in developed world in driving portfolio capital flows (PCFs) to emerging markets (EMs). Results suggest that PCFs to EMs depend mainly on economic activity at the global level and monetary policy in America and Asia, positively on the former and negatively on the latters. PCFs are procyclical with respect to global activity, but countercyclical to regional activity. In aggregate, regional variations contribute more than global variations. This implies that economic divergence in the developed world can have significant effects on EMs via PCFs.     

跨境资本流动结构变化对中国股票市场的冲击风险研究

随着上海自贸区的快速发展,跨境流动资本呈现新的结构特征。人民币流动规模占比增加,短期资本开始主导跨境资金流的趋势,国内资本市场成为跨境资本流动套利的活跃平台。受此影响,国内股票市场不同板块呈现差异化的波动特征。通过选取代表币种、期限和投向的跨境资本流动结构指标以及上证综合指数、创业板综合指数,基于结构向量自回归模型(SVAR)进行实证研究,发现当前跨境资本流动中,币种结构的变动比期限结构和投向结构对我国股票市场的影响显著。     

新兴市场国家的国际资本流动与双危机模型扩展

本文基于新兴市场国家经济背景下,从国内中央银行和国内投资者、国际投资者三类主体进行不完全信息博弈的角度对双危机理论模型进行了有效扩展,探讨了对国际资本流动进行和不进行数量和税费控制条件下银行危机与货币危机发生所满足的必要条件,从而更深入全面地探讨了国际资本流动与双危机之间的传导机制。以马来西亚的实际数据对扩展模型的合理性和有效性进行了验证,并对模型中的主要参数对均衡结果的不同影响进行了分析,为类似中国的新兴市场国家制定安全有效的货币政策以及防范金融危机提供了思路和政策建议。     

Capital Flows During Quantitative Easing: Experiences of Developing Countries

A potentially important side effect of quantitative easing (QE) by the United States Federal Reserve was the expansion of capital flows into developing countries. As a result, there were widespread concerns that reversing QE might trigger financial instability in those countries. The central objective of our article is to empirically investigate this important issue by (1) examining the effect of QE on capital flows into developing Asia and (2) identifying the most significant factors that influence the effect of a QE taper tantrum on exchange rate instability. We find that capital flows into developing countries during QE were at least comparable to those before the global financial crisis. We also find that capital flows during QE and the symptoms of those capital flows such as high inflation, credit expansion, and the deterioration of the current-account balance accounted for much of the destabilizing effect of a QE taper tantrum. While there is no evidence that macroprudential policies directly reduce the destabilizing effect, they can nevertheless be useful preemptive measures.     

Capital inflows and asset prices: Evidence from emerging Asia

The withdrawal of foreign capital from emerging countries at the height of the recent financial crisis and its quick return sparked a debate about the impact of capital flow surges on asset markets. This paper addresses the response of property prices to an inflow of foreign capital. For that purpose we estimate a panel VAR on a set of Asian emerging market economies, for which the waves of inflows were particularly pronounced, and identify capital inflow shocks based on sign restrictions. Our results suggest that capital inflow shocks have a significant effect on the appreciation of house prices and equity prices. Capital inflow shocks account for – roughly – twice the portion of overall house price changes they explain in OECD countries. We also address cross-country differences in the house price responses to shocks, which are most likely due to differences in the monetary policy response to capital inflows.     

The Association Between Operating Cash Flows and Dividend Changes: An Empirical Investigation

The Association between earnings and dividend changes has been established since Lintner's (1956) pioneering work. Subsequent research attempted to establish an association between operating cash flows and dividend changes, given earnings, without success (Simons, 1994). Recently, there has been increased attention in cash flow reporting. Regulatory bodies worldwide have stressed the significance of cash flow information in capital markets. Research on the association between cash flows and dividends has been limited, yielding inconclusive results. The purpose of this study is to re-evaluate and extend prior studies by examining the incremental ability of cash flows to explain dividend changes, given earnings. We argue that a positive relationship between cash flows and dividend changes should exist due to liquidity and accruals management considerations. The empirical evidence of this study supports that the dividend changes-cash flow relationship is significantly positive (a) when operating cash flows are low compared to earnings, and (b) when firm growth is moderate.     

Trade in Financial Services and Capital Movements

International financial liberalization may alter saving–investment imbalances and patterns of capital flows across countries. Using a panel of OECD countries for 1990–1996, I examine how the liberalization of capital movements and financial services trade affects net private capital flows. Capital inflows tend to fall (rise) with the liberalization of commercial presence in banking and securities (insurance) services, possibly reflecting an increase (decrease) in saving. I find that capital account liberalization stimulates capital inflows, suggesting that better access to external financing helps sustain larger current account deficits. When cross-border trade is liberalized, capital inflows change insignificantly.     

Securitization and the balance sheet channel of monetary transmission

This paper shows that the balance sheet channel of monetary transmission is stronger for US banks that securitize their assets. This finding is different, in spirit, from the widely-found negative relationship between financial development and the strength of the lending channel of monetary transmission. Focusing on the balance sheet channel, and using bank-level observations, we find that securitizing banks are more sensitive to borrowers’ balance sheets and that monetary policy has a greater impact on this sensitivity for securitizing banks. The optimality conditions from a simple partial equilibrium framework suggest that the positive effects of securitization on policy effectiveness could be due to the high sensitivity of security prices to policy rates.     

Capital Account Openness,International Trade,and Economic Growth: A Cross-Country Empirical Investigation

New empirical estimates of the effects of capital restrictions on growth support capital account liberalization, especially for developed countries. Capital restrictions reduce the benefits of foreign direct investment (FDI) on growth in developing countries. Estimation results for long-term capital flows demonstrate that countries with higher flows grow faster, challenging the belief that countries must attain a threshold level of development or human capital to benefit from capital inflows. Moreover, findings show that trade with developed countries and FDI inflows are substitutes in developing countries. Overall, the results support capital account liberalization in developed and developing countries.     

Capital Inflows and the U.S. Housing Boom

We estimate an open‐economy vector autoregressive (VAR) model to study the effect of capital‐inflow shocks on the U.S. housing market. We look at different external shocks that generate capital inflows to the U.S., in particular “saving‐glut” shocks and foreign monetary‐policy expansions. The shocks are identified with theoretically robust sign restrictions derived from an open‐economy dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) model. Our findings suggest that capital inflows that result from “saving‐glut” shocks have a positive and persistent effect on real house prices and real residential investment.     

The Cyclical Relationships Between South Africa's Net Capital Inflows and Fiscal and Monetary Policies

This paper investigates the cyclical relationships between South Africa's post-liberalization net capital inflows and fiscal and monetary policies. Correlation analysis shows that the bulk of South Africa's capital inflows do not have a significant cyclical relationship with fiscal policy but have a procyclical and reactive cyclical relationship with monetary policy. Furthermore, causality analysis finds that fiscal policy reacts to monetary policy and capital flows, whereas capital flows react to monetary policy. Hence, these results suggest that South Africa's policymakers are in a better position to control the country's capital inflows using monetary policy than using fiscal policy.     

Mean reversion in long-horizon real exchange rates: Evidence from Latin America

This paper examines mean reversion in real effective exchange rates in six leading Latin American economies during the XXth century using a new data set. A unit-root approach is complemented by an error-correction model including key fundamentals such as terms of trade, trade openness and relative productivities. Unit-root testing shows a very slow process of reversion – if any – to a constant mean in the original series, rejecting the strict PPP hypothesis; however, mean reversion is found after allowing for trends and structural breaks with a half-life average of 1½ years for the six countries. We also found reversion to a conditional mean defined by the co-integrating relationship with an average half-life of 2½ years. Our estimates, although lower than the 3–5 year range that motivated the Rogoff’s puzzle, still indicate the presence of important obstacles to the adjustment process that need further investigation.     

Capital flows,exchange rate management and monetary policy

Capital inflows have brought substantial macro and financial benefits; at the same time, the size and nature of capital inflows have complicated macroeconomic management in recipient countries. Multiple concerns have produced multiple responses by countries to capital inflows. Countries have pursued a combination of policies – let the exchange rate appreciate, accumulate foreign exchange reserves, with or without sterilization, liberalize outflows, tighten monetary and fiscal policies and in a few cases impose capital controls on inflows either directly or through prudential regulation. Experience shows that there are no corner solutions and countries have to resort to a judicious mix of these policies depending on the prevailing circumstances.