Working Papers
1991
December 1, 1991
Evaluating Policy Rules Under Imperfect Credibility
Description: Evaluation of policy rules using empirical macroeconomic models is usually done on the assumption that the rules are perfectly credible. However, there are usually circumstances that cause the authorities to abandon any given rule. The public's expectations reflect this possibility. In the paper, credibility is assumed to depend on the probability that the authorities will abandon a rule because the resulting utility exceeds that from maintaining the rule. Simulations of a disinflation policy leading to price stability are presented. Its credibility varies over time, depending on the paths for output and inflation.
December 1, 1991
Interest Rate Liberalization: Some Lessons From Africa
Description: This paper undertakes a survey of theoretical considerations and an analysis of the experience of five African countries with interest rate liberalization. Despite substantial progress in monetary policy reforms, liberalization has only partially affected the level and variability of interest rates. Several factors—macroeconomic instability, oligopolistic financial markets, the absence of developed capital markets, as well as the sequencing of the liberalization programs and the asymmetric availability of information—explain the increase in the spread between lending and deposit rates as well as the rather inflexible pattern of interest rates during the transition to a market-based financial system.
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1991
November 1, 1991
Cross-Border Deposits and Monetary Aggregates in the Transition to EMU
Description: This paper discusses the effect of cross-border deposits (CBDs) for the stability of the relation between monetary aggregates and nominal GDP in the five largest EC countries. The analysis is developed in terms of “information content” of alternative money definitions (including or excluding selected subsets of CBDs), derived from a multicountry simultaneous system of money demand equations. We show that in the most recent period traditional money aggregates have lost information value and that they are dominated by alternative money definitions that include CBDs, such as those based on the residency of the holder or on the currency of denomination.
November 1, 1991
Currency Diversification of Reserves and Sovereign Debt for Small Open Economies
Description: An approach for minimizing risk through diversification of foreign exchange reserves and sovereign borrowings is proposed for central banks of small open economies. This approach--developed in a simple 2-period, 3-country framework--differs from past work in that the elements of exchange and price risk associated with trade and payments are considered in the portfolio allocation problem. The analysis shows that the net level of reserves and the primary transactions balance affect the optimal portfolio leading to deviations from the optimal allocation prescribed by the classical portfolio model. In addition, this result has implications for the currency composition of exchange market intervention transactions.
November 1, 1991
Foreign Currency Deposits: Implications for Macroeconomic Policies
Description: This paper discusses the relationship between foreign currency deposits and money, and it shows that the indexation of part of the nominal money supply to the exchange rate, as a result of the presence of foreign currency deposits, will increase the inflationary effects of monetary disequilibria under a floating exchange rate system and will reduce the effect of a devaluation of a usually fixed exchange rate. When a real exchange rate rule is followed, the presence of foreign currency deposits implies that there is less of a tradeoff between the rate of nominal depreciation/inflation and the level of the real exchange rate. The paper shows how certain aspects of financial programming may be affected by the presence of these deposits.
November 1, 1991
Stopping High Inflation: An Analytical Overview
Description: The IMF Working Papers series is designed to make IMF staff research available to a wide audience. Almost 300 Working Papers are released each year, covering a wide range of theoretical and analytical topics, including balance of payments, monetary and fiscal issues, global liquidity, and national and international economic developments.
Notes: Also published in Staff Papers, Vol. 39, No. 3, September 1992.