Implementing international monetary cooperation through inflation targeting

This paper presents a two-country dynamic general equilibrium model with imperfect competition and nominal price rigidities in which productivity shocks coexist with markup shocks. After analyzing the features of the optimal cooperative solution, we show that this allocation can be implemented in a strategic context through inflation-targeting regimes. Under these regimes, each monetary authority minimizes a quadratic loss function that targets only domestic targets, namely, GDP inflation and the output gap

Challenges for the dollar as a reserve currency

Gianluca Benigno examines the extent to which the financial crisis has undermined the dollar's pre-eminence.reserve currency, international, USA, China

Second-Order Approximation of Dynamic Models with Time-Varying Risk

This paper provides first and second-order approximation methods for the solution of nonlinear dynamic stochastic models in which the exogenous state variables follow conditionally-linear stochastic processes displaying time-varying risk. The first-order approximation is consistent with a conditionally-linear model in which risk is still timevarying but has no distinct role - separated from the primitive stochastic disturbances - in influencing the endogenous variables. The second-order approximation of the solution, instead, is sufficient to get this role. Moreover, risk premia, evaluated using only a first-order approximation of the solution, will be also time varying.stochastic volatility, second order approximation

Are Valuation Effects Desirable from a Global Perspective?

Recent studies have emphasized the role of valuation effects due to exchange rate movements in easing the process of adjustment of the external balance of a country. This paper asks to what extent valuation effects are desirable from a global perspective as a mean to achieve an efficient allocation of resources. In a frictionless world, it is desirable to have large movements in prices and exchange rates. But once a small concern for price stability is introduced not only should prices be stabilized but also the response of the exchange rate should be muted. There is a minor role for valuation effects that depends both on the size and composition of assets and liabilities.

Portfolio Choices with Near Rational Agents: A Solution of Some International-Finance Puzzles

A dynamic model of consumption and portfolio decisions is analyzed in which agents seek robust choices against some misspecification of the model probability distribution. This near-rational environment can at the same time explain an imperfect international portfolio diversification and break the link between cross-country consumption correlation and real exchange rate as it is usually implied by standard preference specifications. Portfolio decisions imply moment restrictions on asset prices that are useful to extract information on the degree of near-rationality present in the data.

Site-Directed Mutagenesis in Fructose 6-Phosphate-1-Kinase From Bacillus Stearothermophilus and Molecular Cloning and Sequencing of a Partial Human Muscle Fructose 6-Phosphate-1-Kinase Gene.

Fructose 6-phosphate-1-kinase (PFK: EC. 2.7.1.11) catalyzes the phosphorylation of $\beta$-fructose 6-phosphate (Fru 6-P) to $\beta$-fructose 1,6-bisphosphate. The first part of this dissertation shows that PFK from Bacillus stearothermophilus (BsPFK) unlike the major PFK from E. coli (EcPFKA) exhibits a hyperbolic profile with respect to Fru 6-P concentration in the absence of phosphoenolpyruvate (PEP). BsPFK is sensitive to inhibition by high ATP concentrations and competitively inhibited by GDP or ADP. Arg-252 residue of BsPFK has been proposed to be involved in the binding of Fru 6-P. Mutation of this residue to alanine (RA252) increases BsPFK affinity for its inhibitor PEP (a 68-fold difference compared to wild type) and dramatically decreases Fru 6-P affinity (1,500-fold increase in Km). Its higher sensitivity to ATP inhibition is relieved by ADP, GDP or higher Fru 6-P concentrations. Mutation of Arg-252 to lysine (RK252) increases the affinity of the enzyme for PEP by only 2-fold and increases its Km for Fru 6-P by only 50-fold. The data indicate that the Arg-252 residue plays a major role in both Fru 6-P binding and allosteric interaction between the subunits. Arg-25, Arg-211 and Asp-59 residues have been mutated to alanine; and Asp-59 also to methionine. Arg-25 mutant has half the affinity for Fru 6-P compared to the wild type and exhibits sigmoidicity with respect to this substrate (Hill # = 2.0). Asp-59 $\to$ Ala mutant has the same affinity for PEP as the wild type whereas Asp-59 $\to$ Met mutant has 3-fold higher affinity for this modulator and the inhibition is reversed by GDP. Arg-25 and Arg-211 mutants are 100-fold less sensitive to PEP inhibition which is not relieved by GDP. The data prove unequivocally that Arg-25 and Arg-211, but not Asp-59, are involved in the direct binding of PEP and GDP. The last part of this dissertation involves isolation of a clone containing the nontranslated 5\sp\prime flanking region of the human muscle PFK (HMPFK) gene. It has an additional intron extending from nucleotide $-$97 to $-$9 upstream of the ATG start codon. Furthermore, HMPFK gene is more AT rich than the rabbit gene

Corioma benigno.

Trabalho de Conclusão de Curso - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro de Ciências da Saúde, Departamento de Tocoginecologia, Curso de Medicina, Florianópolis, 197