IS INDONESIA’S CURRENT ACCOUNT BALANCE OPTIMAL? EVIDENCE FROM AN INTERTEMPORAL APPROACH

This study investigates whether Indonesia’s Current Account (CA) balance is intertemporally solvent. We provide fresh evidence on Indonesia’s CA deficit solvency by considering post-crisis period data and conducting sub-sample analysis. Our findings suggest that Indonesia’s CA is not solvent. We notice evidence of excess lending prior to the global financial crisis of 2008 and excess borrowing in the postcrisis period. Policymakers need to focus on the composition of capital flows and management of volatile capital flows since discouraging foreign capital inflows may serve as a deterrent to economic growth

COVID-19 UNCERTAINTY AND MONETARY POLICY RESPONSES: EVIDENCE FROM EMERGING MARKET ECONOMIES

This paper examines the effectiveness of monetary policy transmission in emerging economies during the COVID-19 outbreak. Using data from 14 emerging economies severely affected by the pandemic and the autoregressive distributed lag approach to cointegration, the study examines the effectiveness of monetary policy in affecting output, inflation, and credit. The study finds that: (1) In most economies, the monetary policy transmission to inflation is weakened due to the uncertainty created by the COVID-19 pandemic; (2) in a few economies, the transmission is found to be effective in stabilizing credit and output; and (3) the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic induced economic agents to follow a “cautionary” or “wait and see” approach

IS INDONESIA’S CURRENT ACCOUNT BALANCE OPTIMAL? EVIDENCE FROM AN INTERTEMPORAL APPROACH

This study investigates whether Indonesia’s Current Account (CA) balance is intertemporally solvent. We provide fresh evidence on Indonesia’s CA deficit solvency by considering post-crisis period data and conducting sub-sample analysis. Our findings suggest that Indonesia’s CA is not solvent. We notice evidence of excess lending prior to the global financial crisis of 2008 and excess borrowing in the postcrisis period. Policymakers need to focus on the composition of capital flows and management of volatile capital flows since discouraging foreign capital inflows may serve as a deterrent to economic growth.</jats:p

Testing the intertemporal sustainability of current account in the presence of endogenous structural breaks: Evidence from the top deficit countries

We examine the sustainability of the current account (CA) deficits among the top deficit countries occurring consistently in the period after the global financial crisis period. Hence, we chose four developed economies, namely, Australia, Canada, the UK, and the US, and three emerging market economies, namely, Brazil, India, and Turkey. The results indicate that information about structural breaks, occurring around the GFC period, improves the cointegration results significantly. We find that five out of the seven countries, except Australia and the UK, exhibit sustainable CA deficits. Further, results with disaggregated CA indicates that the services account is sustainable in all countries while goods account is unsustainable in Australia, the UK, and India. Overall, our findings reveal the possibility of aggregation bias in affecting the CA sustainability results. Thus, CA deficits are not necessarily bad for an economy if it can generate sufficiently large future net export surpluses to pay its current net foreign outstanding debt

The nexus between the exchange rates and interest rates: evidence from BRIICS economies during the COVID-19 pandemic

Purpose This paper aims to investigate whether the interest rate differentials Granger cause expected change in the exchange rate during the COVID-19 period. The study examines if the investors in the international assets and exchange rate markets take advantages of the relevant information obtained during the COVID-19 pandemic. Design/methodology/approach This paper used daily data ranging from January 31, 2020 to June 30, 2020 and considered BRIICS economies. The study implemented the Toda–Yamamoto’s Granger causality approach to identify the causality between interest rate differentials and exchange rates. For robustness checks, the study used ARLD short-run dynamics to infer causal relations. Findings Overall, the results indicate that the interest rate differentials improve the predictability of subsequent exchange rate changes in all six BRIICS economies during the COVID-19 period wherein investors are forward-looking. The empirical results pass the robustness checks. Originality/value There is a lack of studies exploring the relationship between interest rate differentials and exchange rates in the presence of an unanticipated event such as the current pandemic. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to explore the causal linkages between interest rate differentials and expected change in exchange rates, focusing on the COVID-19 outbreak period. </jats:sec

Testing deviations from PPP and UIP: evidence from BRICS economies

Purpose This paper aims to investigate the interrelations between purchasing power parity (PPP) and uncovered interest parity (UIP) in BRICS economies, namely, Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, by checking the validity of the capital-enhanced equilibrium exchange rate (CHEER) approach. Further, this study tests whether the CHEER results are data frequency-dependent. Design/methodology/approach The present study uses monthly data ranging from 1997M01 to 2016M12 and considers the US economy as the representative foreign country. The study uses structural break unit root test and structural break cointegration technique to test the presence of economic relationships between nominal exchange rates and each of the price and interest rate differentials. Then, the study examines the validity of the CHEER approach by testing the appropriate theoretical restrictions. Findings The cointegration results suggest the existence of two cointegrating vectors representing UIP and PPP conditions. For all countries, the data appear to support the hypothesis that the system contains UIP and PPP relations. However, each of the international parity hypotheses is strongly rejected when formulated in isolation and jointly, leading to repudiation of the CHEER validity. Further, it is found that the results are data frequency-dependent and suggest that higher frequencies should be used as they provide additional information. Originality/value First, the literature on equilibrium exchange rates in BRICS economies is scanty. BRICS economies are large-emerging economies and one of the fastest growing economies and thus entail an empirical enquiry on their exchange rates. Second, the empirical application has mainly used monthly data to test the validity of the CHEER approach. However, data frequencies could affect the results. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to check data frequency-dependency in examination of the CHEER approach. </jats:sec