Working Papers
2014
October 15, 2014
The Making of a Continental Financial System: Lessons for Europe from Early American History
Description: Alexander Hamilton was the first U.S. Treasury Secretary from 1789 to 1795. When he started, the Federal Government was in default. During his tenure, U.S. Treasuries became the ultimate safe asset. He successfully managed expectations, achieved debt service reduction, and stabilized financial panics. He delivered sound public finances and financial stability. In the end, the U.S. possessed a modern financial system able to finance innovation and growth. At a time when Europe is working its way out of the sovereign debt crisis and implementing Banking Union and Financial Union, it is worthwhile to search for lessons from early U.S. history.
September 26, 2014
Food Prices and the Multiplier Effect of Trade Policy
Description: This paper studies the relationship between trade policy and food prices. We show that, when individuals are loss averse, governments may use trade policy to shield the domestic economy from large food price shocks. This creates a complementarity between the price of food in international markets and trade policy. Specifically, unilateral actions give rise to a "multiplier effect": when a shock drives up the price of food, exporters respond by imposing restrictions while importers wind down protection, thus exacerbating the initial shock and soliciting further trade policy activism. We test the key prediction of the theory with a new dataset that comprises monthly information on trade measures across 77 countries and 33 food products for the period 2008-11, finding evidence of a multiplier effect in food trade policy. These findings contribute to inform the broader debate on the proper regulation of food trade policy within the multilateral trading system.
September 25, 2014
Reforming the Corporate Governance of Italian Banks
Description: Sound corporate governance is essential for a well-functioning banking system and the integrity of financial markets. The paper discusses the corporate governance of Italian banks, its regulatory framework, and the specific challenges arising from the role played by foundations and large cooperatives. Although Italian banks have recently made progress in improving their corporate governance, more needs to be done. In this regard, further improvements should include: (i) strengthening further the existing banking regulations through stricter fit-and-proper rules for directors and controlling shareholders; (ii) implementing the new related party lending regulation with tightened definitions; (iii) strengthening oversight of foundations when they are the controlling shareholders in banks; and (iv) facilitating the transformation of large cooperatives into joint stock companies.
September 25, 2014
The Great Cross-Border Bank Deleveraging: Supply Constraints and Intra-Group Frictions
Description: International banks greatly reduced their direct cross-border and local affiliates’ lending as the global financial crisis strained balance sheets, lowered borrower demand, and changed government policies. Using bilateral, lender-borrower countrydata and controlling for credit demand, we show that reductions largely varied in line with markets’ prior assessments of banks’ vulnerabilities, with banks’ financial statement variables and lender-borrower country characteristics playing minor roles. We find evidence that moving resources within banking groups became more restricted as drivers of reductions in direct cross-border loans differ from those for local affiliates’ lending, especially for impaired banking systems. Home bias induced by government interventions, however, affected both equally.
September 25, 2014
How Much is A Lot? Historical Evidence on the Size of Fiscal Adjustments
Description: The sizeable fiscal consolidation required to stabilize the debt-to-GDP ratios in several countries in the aftermath of the global crisis raises a crucial question on its feasibility. To answer this question, we rely on historical evidence from a sample of 91 adjustment episodes of countries during 1945–2012 that needed and wanted to adjust in order to stabilize debt to GDP. We find that, in at least half the cases, countries improved their cyclically adjusted primary balances by close to 5 percent of GDP. We also observe that, while countries typically make substantial efforts to stabilize debt, once this objective is achieved, they tend to ease their primary balances and do not necessarily get back to their initial lower debt-to-GDP ratio. We find that consolidations tended to be larger when the initial deficit was high and adjustment efforts were sustained over time. Fiscal adjustments also tended to be larger when accompanied by an easing of monetary conditions and, to a lesser extent, by an improvement in credit conditions.
September 24, 2014
Food Inflation in India: The Role for Monetary Policy
Description: Indian food and fuel inflation has remained high for several years, and second-round effects on core inflation are estimated to be large. This paper estimates the size of second-round effects using an estimated reduced-form general equilibrium model of the Indian economy, which incorporates pass-through from headline inflation to core inflation. The results indicate that India's inflation is highly inertial and persistent. Due to second-round effects, the gap between headline inflation and core inflation decreases by about three fourths within one year as core inflation catches up with headline inflation. Large second-round effects stem from several factors, such as the high share of food in household expenditure and the role of food inflation in informing inflation expectations and wage setting. Analysis suggests that in order to durably reduce the current high inflation, the monetary policy stance needs to remain tight for a considerable length of time. In addition, progress on structural reforms to raise potential growth is critical to reduce the burden on monetary policy.
September 24, 2014
Soaring of the Gulf Falcons: Diversification in the GCC Oil Exporters in Seven Propositions
Description: A key priority for the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries is to create a dynamic non-oil tradable sector to support sustainable growth. Since export diversification takes a long time, it has to start now. We argue that the failure to diversify away from oil stems mainly from market failures rather than government failures. To tackle market failures, the government needs to change the incentive structure for workers and firms. Experiences of oil exporters that managed to diversify suggest that a focus on competing in international markets and an emphasis on technological upgrade and climbing the “quality ladder” are crucial.
September 24, 2014
A Constrained Choice? Impact of Concessionality Requirements on Borrowing Behavior
Description: This paper uses the propensity matching score approach to assess the impact of the IMF’s debt limits policy (DLP) on borrowing behavior in countries eligible to borrow from its concessional lending window. The paper finds that countries under the DLP borrow significantly higher amounts of concessional resources. However, there is no evidence that the DLP significantly impacts the level of non-concessional borrowing nor the terms of such borrowing. This result is confirmed by the heterogeneity analysis, suggesting that the level of development, rather than concessionality requirements, is the key driver of non-concessional borrowing.
September 24, 2014
Does the Clarity of Inflation Reports Affect Volatility in Financial Markets?
Description: We study whether clarity of central bank inflation reports affects return volatility in financial markets. We measure clarity of reports by the Czech National Bank, the European Central Bank, the Bank of England, and Sveriges Riksbank using the Flesch-Kincaid grade level, a standard readability measure. We find some evidence, mainly for the euro area, of a negative relationship between clarity and market volatility prior to and during the early stage of the global financial crisis. As the crisis unfolded, there is no longer robust evidence of a negative connection. We conclude that reducing noise using clear reports is possible but not without challenges, especially in times of crisis.
September 17, 2014
How Much Carbon Pricing is in Countries’ Own Interests? The Critical Role of Co-Benefits
Description: This paper calculates, for the top twenty emitting countries, how much pricing of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions is in their own national interests due to domestic co-benefits (leaving aside the global climate benefits). On average, nationally efficient prices are substantial, $57.5 per ton of CO2 (for year 2010), reflecting primarily health co-benefits from reduced air pollution at coal plants and, in some cases, reductions in automobile externalities (net of fuel taxes/subsidies). Pricing co-benefits reduces CO2 emissions from the top twenty emitters by 13.5 percent (a 10.8 percent reduction in global emissions). However, co-benefits vary dramatically across countries (e.g., with population exposure to pollution) and differentiated pricing of CO2 emissions therefore yields higher net benefits (by 23 percent) than uniform pricing. Importantly, the efficiency case for pricing carbon’s co-benefits hinges critically on (i) weak prospects for internalizing other externalities through other pricing instruments and (ii) productive use of carbon pricing revenues.