Kinematics of the southern galaxy cluster Abell 3733

We report radial velocities for 99 galaxies with projected positions within 30 arcmin of the center of the cluster A3733 obtained with the MEFOS multifiber spectrograph at the 3.6-m ESO telescope. These measurements are combined with 39 redshifts previously published by Stein (1996) to built a collection of 112 galaxy redshifts in the field of A3733, which is used to examine the kinematics and structure of this cluster. We assign cluster membership to 74 galaxies with heliocentric velocities in the interval 10500-13000 km/s. From this sample of cluster members, we infer a heliocentric systemic velocity for A3733 of 11653{+74}{-76} km/s, which implies a mean cosmological redshift of 0.0380, and a velocity dispersion of 614{+42}{-30} km/s. The application of statistical substructure tests to a magnitude-limited subset of the latter sample reveals evidence of non-Gaussianity in the distribution of ordered velocities in the form of lighter tails and possible multimodality. Spatial substructure tests do not find, however, any significant clumpiness in the plane of the sky, although the existence of subclustering along the line-of-sight cannot be excluded.Comment: AA-LaTeX2e style; 10 pages, 2 Postscript figures, Table 1 appended. To be published in Astronomy and Astrophysics. Also available at ftp://pcess1.am.ub.es/pub/AA/a3733.ps.g

Testing the BalassA-Samuelson hypothesis in two different groups of countries: OECD and Latin America

This paper studies the Balassa-Samuelson hypothesis (BSH) in the context of two areas with strong differences in economic development, twelve OECD countries and twelve Latin American economies, taking the USA as the benchmark. Applying panel cointegration techniques, we find that while the first stage of the hypothesis, which links productivities and prices, is satisfied in each group of countries, the second stage, which relates relative sector prices with the real exchange rate, only holds in the Latin American area. The failure of the latter in the OECD countries as a whole is reflected in departures from PPP in the tradable sectors.Balassa-Samuelson effect, Panel cointegration, Economic development, Exchange rate systems

Exchange Rate Regimes for the New Member States of the European Union

One important issue for the new Member States (NMS) of the EU is the choice of the exchange rate regime that will allow them to participate successfully in the EMU process. Two exchange rate arrangements, compatible with the EU Treaty and ERM2 regulations, deserve special attention: flexible exchange rate regime and currency board with respect to the euro. The first regime (within stipulated bands), coupled with an inflation targeting scheme, agrees with the spirit of the European Commission and absorbs more easily supply shocks and Balassa Samuelson effects (which are present in real convergence and catching up episodes). It also prompts the process of nominal convergence. The second regime is suited to countries that need to foster the credibility of their monetary policy, but makes real adjustments to country-specific shocks and Balassa-Samuelson effects more difficult and/or costly. In this paper we investigate the dynamics of output and inflation under each exchange rate regime in NMS during the post EU accession and Maastricht phases. For that purpose, our model extends Gerlach and Smets (2000) and Detken and Gaspar (2003), icluding market distortions and three possible exchange rate regimes. In the empirical part of the paper we estimate SVAR models, following Bayoumi and Eichengreen (1993) methodology, in order to extract variances and covariances between shocks to each NMS and to the euro zone and compute individual social losses under each exchange rate arrangement. We use monthly data on industrial production and CPI for eight NMS countries. Our main result is that the optimal choice varies depending on the institutional and structural features of each economy, and on the likely source and nature of economic shocks to which it is exposed with respect to the whole euro area. Interestingly, the results for each country seem to conform to the general prescriptions that one would derive from the theory of optimal currency areasEU enlargment, exchange rate systems, SVAR, European monetary integration