Exchange Rate Expectations, the Forward Exchange Rate Bias and Risk Premia in Target Zones

Expected rates of depreciation within the target zone for the exchange rates of four Nordic countries during 1979–1989 are estimated. Combining these with expected rates of devaluation estimated by Edin and Vredin (1993) we obtain time-series of the overall expected exchange rate change. We can thus construct time-series of foreign exchange risk premia and expectational errors, following which we decompose the forward exchange rate bias into portions attributable to expectational errors and/or risk premia. The conclusion is that time-varying risk premia appear to be the dominant cause of deviations from uncovered interest parity while the role of expectational errors is less clear. Copyright Kluwer Academic Publishers 1997exchange rates, target zones, risk premia, forward rate bias,

World-Wide Purchasing Power Parity

Not available.Long-run purchasing power parity; Multivariate cointegration analysis; Bootstrap inference;

Monetary Policy in an Estimated Open-Economy Model with Imperfect Pass-Through

We develop a structural model of a small open economy with gradual exchange rate pass-through and endogenous inertia in inflation and output. We then estimate the model by matching the implied impulse responses with those obtained from a VAR model estimated on Swedish data. Although our model is highly stylized it captures very well the responses of output, domestic and imported inflation, the interest rate, and the real exchange rate. In order to account for the observed persistence in the real exchange rate and the large deviations from UIP, however, we need a large and volatile premium on foreign exchange.calibration; estimation; new open-economy macroeconomics; structural open-economy model

Evaluating Inflation Targeting Using a Macroeconometric Model

This paper uses a structurally estimated macroeconometric model, denoted the MC model, to evaluate inflation targeting in the United States. Various interest rate rules are tried with differing weights on inflation and output, and various optimal control problems are solved using differing weights on inflation and output targets. Price-level targeting is also considered. The results show that 1) there are output costs to inflation targeting, especially for price shocks, 2) price-level targeting is dominated by inflation targeting, 3) the estimated interest rate rule of the Fed (in Table 4) is consistent with the Fed placing equal weights on inflation and unemployment in a loss function, 4) the estimated interest rate rule does a fairly good job at lowering variability, and 5) considerable economic variability is left after the Fed has done its best. Overall, the results suggest that the Fed should continue to behave as it has in the past