Real Exchange Rate Depreciation Research Articles

Impact of Capital Flight on Exchange rate in Nigeria

The study examined capital flight and real exchange rate in Nigeria from 1990 to 2014. The study used five independent variables (capital flight, foreign direct investment, current account balance, foreign borrowing and external reserves) and one dependent variable (real exchange rate). Test carried out include unit root test, co-integration test, causality test and ordinary least square. The study revealed that: There is positive significant relationship between foreign borrowing and real exchange rate in Nigeria, there is negative and insignificant relationship between capital flight and real exchange rate in Nigeria, there is positive and insignificant relationship between foreign direct investment and real exchange rate in Nigeria, there is negative insignificant relationship between current account balance and real exchange rate in Nigeria, and there is positive insignificant relationship between foreign reserves and real exchange rate in Nigeria. Based on the findings, the study recommends that, real exchange rate depreciation and appreciation can cause an increase in capital flight, there is a serious need by the fiscal authorities to pursue policy that creates less exchange rate uncertainties and should also ensure that real exchange rate movements are stable and this can also be complemented by closely observing the general rise in the price level.

Asymmetric real exchange rates and poverty: The role of remittances

This paper explores the asymmetric effect of real exchange rate changes on poverty through the remittance channel for a panel of 99 countries, spanning the period 1980–2015. Considering a threshold partial adjustment modelling approach, the results document that real exchange rate depreciations exert a stronger positive effect on poverty through remittances. The results are expected to be of substantial importance in the case of emerging and developing countries in designing exchange rate and inflation policies that affect the poverty levels of their population through the mechanism of remittances.

An Analysis of Trade Patterns and the Effects of the Real Exchange Rate Movements in East Asia

ABSTRACTThis article investigates the patterns of vertical specialization in trade among China, Japan and Korea, and the effects of real exchange rate fluctuations under a multistage production process. By extending the models of Yi (2003, 2010), we derive two distinct features of vertical specialization and test them using Time-Varying Parameter (TVP) VAR. We find that a positive shock to China’s final good consumption increases the intermediate goods trade between Korea and China, with expanding magnitude over time. In addition, the positive effect of a real exchange rate depreciation on intermediate goods trade is strengthened through the competitiveness-enhancing channel, with this effect being more pronouncing in Korea-China trade than in Korea-Japan trade.

Fiscal Policy Effects in Ukraine

This paper empirically analyses fiscal policy effects in Ukraine using different identification strategies within the framework of a vector error correction model (VECM). For quarterly data from 2001 to 2016, we find a robust positive impact of both government expenditure and net revenue upon output in Ukraine, which closely corresponds with the predictions of the Mankiw-Summers model in the case of high demand for money in relation to consumption expenditure combined with significant investment elasticity in relation to the interest rate. In other respects, the fiscal policy transmission mechanism exhibits several standard features (such as an increase in government expenditure after a positive shock to revenue or a widening of the budget deficit following an interest rate hike). The results suggest the feasibility of revenue-based fiscal consolidation policies in Ukraine, as better tax collection may contribute to economic growth even in the short run. Since there is a robust conventional inverse relationship between interest rate and output, one of the puzzling results is that government expenditure puts downward pressure on the former, with net revenues being neutral in this respect. Real exchange rate (RER) depreciation is behind the decrease in output in the baseline model, but alternative identification schemes suggest that it is likely to be contractionary in the short run while turning expansionary in the long run.

Global value chain and its impact on the linkage between exchange rate and export: Cases of China, Japan and Korea

AbstractThe link between exchange rate and trade has been studied for a long time, but there is no consensus about their relation. This paper tests the old argument, whether depreciation of real effective exchange rates (REERs) raises exports. We differentiate the test with earlier studies by employing a new measurement of REER and incorporating the effect of GVCs. We measured REER at industry level with value‐added trade weights. We analysed the topic with LSDV and system GMM for China, Japan and Korea since these counties are known to participate actively in GVCs. Our main finding is that exchange rate has significant impact on trade for three countries. However, the movement of elasticity of export to REER varies by country. While the elasticity in China decreased over time, Korea and Japan experienced increasing patterns between mid‐1990s and mid‐2000s and decreasing trends afterwards. This study also tests whether the level of incorporation in GVCs causes a change in elasticity. The results show that growing participation in GVCs lowers the elasticity of export to REER in absolute value. However, this result is only statistically significant in Korea.

Real exchange rate (RER) as a policy tool for industrial diversification and growth in Africa

ABSTRACTAppropriate exchange rate (ER) policies in some Asian and Latin American countries have led to improvement in industrial diversification and growth. The growth ‘miracle’ of the Asian countries centres on the effective use of ER and trade policies, specifically the adoption of depreciation of real exchange rate (RER). However, the case of Africa is different, as the continent is yet to adopt an appropriate ER policy that enhances industrial diversification and growth. Examining the effectiveness of the RER as a policy tool for industrial diversification and growth in 36 African countries, this study applied a dynamic generalised method of moments (GMM) estimation technique to determine how changes in RER affects the growth composition of the three main productive sectors – primary, secondary, and tertiary and their response rates. Our findings suggest that the primary sector leads to appreciation of the RER, while the secondary and tertiary lead to depreciation of the RER. This result has serious policy implication for the Africa continent that has relied so much on the production of primary commodities. Rather than pursue the policy of ER depreciation which affects the primary and secondary sectors, policy shift in favour of the tertiary sector should be highly encouraged.

Bilateral Trade Elasticity of Serbia and Her Trading Partners

Abstract Almost all countries face the problems of trade balance, although they are more inherent in developing countries and economies in transition. A majority of economists adhere to a common opinion that real depreciation may lead to an improvement of trade balance. That said, countries encountering trade balance issues use real exchange rate depreciation in order to improve trade balance. In fact, this research refers to the assessment of bilateral elasticity effect of real exchange rate depreciation and the income on export and import demand function of Serbia and its nine leading partners. 2004Q1-2015Q4 data and ARDL approach have been used in this research. The results obtained show the presence of the J-curve in cases of Germany, Austria and Croatia. On the other hand, we examined if the Marshall-Lerner condition was fulfilled in the case of bilateral trade with Austria. Finally, we found that the elasticity of income has a greater effect on the export and import demand function, in relation to the elasticity of the exchange rate.

RMB Exchange Rate and Urban-rural Income Gap

The reform of RMB exchange rate formation mechanism has been advanced constantly and RMB exchange rate flexibility also has been enhanced orderly since July 2015, when China adopted a managed, floating exchange rate regime with reference to a basket of currencies instead of fixed exchange rate regime being pegged to the US dollar. In August 2015, China once again carried out the reform aiming at improving the central parity rate mechanism of RMB exchange rate against US dollar. Since then, the two-way volatility of RMB exchange rate has been normalized. As the price of home currency in the international market, the exchange rate can produce price and wealth effects along with its fluctuations, thereby resulting in distributional effect. On the one hand, owing to differentiated trade goods produced and consumed between rural and urban residents, the RMB exchange rate changes play a role in trade structure, industrial structure, employment structure and economic growth, and further in urban-rural income distribution pattern, by affecting import and export trade. On the other hand, the RMB exchange rate changes can affect types & amount of currencies that are possessed by urban-rural residents, and then have an important effect on cross-border capital investment. Especially with the internationalization of the RMB and the two-way opening-up of the financial market, the marketization of RMB exchange rate will be further heightened, thus it is no doubt that the effect of RMB exchange rate changes on income distribution will be strengthened.As an important aspect of unequal income distribution, urban-rural income gap has always been a major concern of all circles in China. Under the dual urban and rural economic background, this paper theoretically depicts micro mechanism concerning the effect of RMB exchange rate changes on urban-rural income gap. Then it applies panel threshold regression model proposed by Hansen(1999) with provincial data during the period of 1994 to 2016 and endogenous grouping to empirically investigate asymmetric and regional heterogeneous features of the effect of RMB exchange rate changes on urban-rural income gap in 28 Chinese provinces. Our results show that the effect of real effective RMB exchange rate changes on urban-rural income gap is not fixed, but depends on changes in regional per capita income and the degree of trade openness, thereby being featured by asymmetry and regional heterogeneity. Specifically speaking, the appreciation (depreciation) of real effective RMB exchange rate can reduce (expand) the urban-rural income gap in the provinces with low income level & low trade openness as well as middle income level & high trade openness, but will expand (reduce)the urban-rural income gap in the provinces with high income level and high trade openness. However, the changes in the real effective RMB exchange rate do not have an obvious effect on the urban-rural income gap in the provinces with middle and high income levels and low trade openness.Based on the conclusions of this paper, we can get the following enlightenment. Firstly, when formulating policies narrowing down the urban-rural income gap, Chinese governments should look upon the distribution effect of exchange rate changes and take different measures in different regions, to respond to the shock of exchange rate changes to urban-rural income gap. Secondly, to narrow down relative labor productivity gap between urban and rural areas is one of the important directions to alleviate income gap. Thirdly, in the process of expanding financial opening-up and trade openness, local governments should pay attention to the improvement of rural financial development and trade environment, and change the situation that rural areas cannot or will not enjoy the dividends of financial opening-up and trade openness to a greater extent, thereby providing conditions for narrowing down urban-rural income gap.The contributions of this paper are as follows:firstly, the existing literature investigates urban-rural income gap mainly from the perspectives of macroeconomic development, policy differences and historical legacy, while this paper focuses on exchange rate changes, which would enrich the previous research; secondly, we utilize the panel threshold approach and further explore the regional heterogeneous feature of the effect of RMB exchange rate changes on urban-rural income gap through endogenous grouping according to the threshold value, which is helpful to examine the income distribution effect resulting from real exchange rate changes more comprehensively & objectively; thirdly, the theoretical and empirical analysis of this paper helps us to understand the intrinsic mechanism and external manifestation of the effect of RMB exchange rate changes on urban-rural income gap, and then provides some enlightenment for governments to make relevant policies to reduce urban-rural income gap.

Multi‐product exporters, variable markups and exchange rate fluctuations

AbstractIn this paper we investigate how firms adjust markups across products in response to fluctuations in the real exchange rate. We estimate markups at the market–product–plant level using detailed panel production and cost data from Mexican manufacturing between 1994 and 2007. Exploiting variation in the real exchange rate in the aftermath of the peso crisis in December 1994, we provide robust empirical evidence that plants increase their markups and producer prices in response to a real depreciation and that this increase is greater for products with higher productivity. Thus, we provide direct evidence for the theoretical mechanism of variable markup response behind incomplete and heterogeneous exchange rate pass‐through on producer prices. Our empirical methodology allows us to decompose the producer price response to exchange rate shocks into a markup and a marginal cost component using our markup estimates. Using these estimates, we establish that marginal cost at the product–plant level increases more in response to real exchange rate depreciation if the plant has higher share of imported inputs.

Trade competitiveness of Pakistan: evidence from the revealed comparative advantage approach

PurposePakistan’s natural endowment of labour and land is suitable for labour-intensive agriculture and manufacturing sector. This study aims to investigate international trade competitiveness of Pakistan in 14 major industries of agriculture and manufacturing sector, accounting more than 85 per cent of total export receipts.Design/methodology/approachThe competitiveness of Pakistan in selected industries of agriculture and manufacturing sectors from 2003 to 2014 is investigated using the revealed comparative advantage (RCA) index, introduced by Balassa (1965) on HS data collected from the United Nations Commodity Trade database. The obtained indices in this study are then subjected to panel regression analysis to investigate the effect of domestic productivity growth and real exchange rate on international trade competitiveness of major industries.FindingsThe results show that the agriculture sector of Pakistan has higher comparative advantage in raw cotton, cereals, raw leather and fruits. The raw cotton shows the highest competitiveness of 54.46 which is followed by cereals (17.13), leather (9.83) and fruits (1.97). The RCA of the manufacturing sector shows that textile (54.85), carpets (10.72), sports goods (2.18) and beverages (1.47) have higher competitiveness. The RCA, in relatively capital-intensive industries, shows a high disadvantage. The trend analysis shows distorted competitiveness in labour-intensive, textile, carpet and footwear industries. The results of panel regression analysis show that the domestic productivity growth and real exchange rate depreciation have a significant positive impact on the international competitiveness of selected industries. The study urges Pakistan to make its macroeconomic environment investment-friendly and encourage investment in deteriorating labour-intensive industries.Practical implicationsGlobalisation has significantly increased international competition, and Pakistan is losing its competitiveness in labour-intensive industries owing to lack of domestic value addition and development efforts. The major problem with the productivity of these industries is the lack of proper infrastructure, acute energy crisis, lack of domestic and foreign investment and overvaluation of real exchange rate. The domestic investors are shifting their capital either to other domestic sectors and/or other investment-friendly countries. Policymakers in Pakistan should address the problems of these important labour-intensive industries. The government needs to understand macroeconomic uncertainties and make investment-friendly policies to encourage domestic and foreign investment. The future studies should perform in-depth research to identify both microeconomic and macroeconomic variables responsible for deterioration in competitiveness of major labour-intensive industries in the agriculture and manufacturing sectors of Pakistan.Originality/valueThis study is a comprehensive examination into the nature and pattern of international competitiveness of Pakistan in 14 important industries of the agriculture and manufacturing sector which has seldom been investigated empirically. The obtained indices in this study are also subjected to panel regression analysis to explore the effect of domestic productivity growth and real exchange rate depreciation on the international competitiveness of Pakistan.

Sustainability of Dual Exchange Rates in Small Open Economy Burdened with Capital Flight

Using a model of small open economy operating under dual foreign exchange markets, with free exchange rate for financial transactions and quasi-fixed exchange rate for commercial transactions, we show in this paper expansionary monetary policy will be associated with: (a) losses of international reserves; (b) an increase in the spread between the two exchange rates; (c) real exchange rate depreciation. When initial reserves are low the adjustment of the economy towards its steady state equilibrium is more costly in terms of reserve loss and length of time period required for completion of the adjustment process. It is also indicated in the paper when the economy is burdened with capital flight, unless the size of capital flight is small as negligible, there is no guarantee of existence of a unique solution for steady state equilibrium exchange rates. When persistent fiscal deficit and declining official reserves force the government to adopt a decision of foreign exchange liberalization, and floating single exchange rate, instead of the dual exchange system, the findings of the model predict, depreciation of foreign exchange rate will be identical to domestic money growth.

Does Trade Liberalization Improve Trade Balance in Pakistan?

This article examines the impact of trade liberalization, that is, reduction of tariff and non-tariff barriers on trade balance, in Pakistan over the period 1982–2013. The results reveal that reduction of average effective tariff rate improves trade balance in the short run, while lowering of non-tariff barriers deteriorates trade balance in the long run as well as in the short run. The analysis also suggests that depreciation of real effective exchange rate and foreign income causes an improvement in the trade balance, whereas domestic income deteriorates it. The negative association between the reduction in non-tariff barriers and trade balance worsens sustainability of current account of the balance of payments in Pakistan.

Effect of Depreciation of the Exchange Rate on the Trade Balance of Albania

AbstractThe paper investigates the effect of the real effective exchange rate depreciation of the lek on the trade balance of Albania using quarterly data from 1994 to 2015. Bounds testing cointegration approach, vector error correction model (VECM), and impulse response were used for the empirical analysis. The results of the study show a long-term cointegration between the real effective exchange rate (REER) and the trade balance (TB). Specifically, the REER depreciation positively affects the trade balance of Albania in both the long and short run, indicating the weak presence of the J-curve effect. Important recommendations were derived from the results.

Does real exchange rate depreciation increase productivity? Analysis using Korean firm‐level data

AbstractWe examine the effects of real exchange rate (RER) depreciation shocks on firm productivity. Using the firm‐level data of Korean manufacturing industries for 2006–13, we distinguish between yearly RER movement and persistent RER depreciation during 2007–09 and analyse how each affects productivity. We find the positive effect of RER depreciation on productivity among exporters, and this positive effect increases with higher export exposure. However, the positive productivity gain disappears when the depreciation persists. Our findings suggest that while immediate depreciation leads to productivity upgrade via price competitiveness and scale expansion, persistent depreciation nullifies the productivity gain by slackening the innovation effort.

Bilateral Trade Elasticity of Serbia: Is There a J-Curve Effect?

We assess the bilateral elasticity effect of real exchange rate depreciation on the export and import demand functions of Serbia and its nine leading trade partners. Analysing quarterly data for the 2004-2015 period, we find the presence of a J-curve effect in the cases of Germany, Austria and Croatia. In contrast, we find that the Marshall-Lerner conditions are fulfilled in the case of bilateral trade with Austria. Finally, in our estimates the elasticity to income has a greater impact on the export and import demand functions than the elasticity to the exchange rate. JEL Classification: F14, F31, F32

The Effect of Depreciation of the Exchange Rate on the Trade Balance of Albania

AbstractAlmost all countries face the problems of trade balance, although they are more inherent in developing countries and economies in transition. A majority of economists adheres to a common opinion real depreciation may lead to an improvement of the trade balance. That said, countries encountering trade balance issues use real exchange rate depreciation in order to improve the trade balance situation. Albania belongs to the group of transition countries that has been facing negative trade balance over last two decades. National currency devaluations of the lek (ALL) have been used by Albania to improve its trade balance. Therefore, this paper intends to investigate the effect of the real effective exchange rate depreciation of the ALL on the trade balance of Albania using quarterly data from 1994 to 2015. Bounds testing cointegration approach, vector error correction model (VECM) and impulse response were used for empirical analysis. The results of the study show that there exists a long-term cointegration between the real effective exchange rate depreciation and the trade balance. Specifically, real effective exchange rate depreciation positively affects the trade balance of Albania in both the long-run and short-run indicating the weak presence of the J-curve effect. Important recommendations were derived from the results.

Factors of Exports Dynamics and Import Substitution after the Sharp Exchange Rate Depreciation

The article deals with the problem of finding out factors promoting high export growth rates and successful import substitution after the sharp real exchange rate depreciation, which took place in Russia. The share of domestically-produced goods and services in domestic demand based on current prices, as well as the growth rate of the domestic demand covered by domestic production, are used as indicators for import substitution. Following the results of cross-country panel regressions, it is demonstrated that Russia’s positive net foreign assets position is favourable for export growth after the depreciation. On the other hand, the share of imported components in Russian non-oil-and-gas exports is close to the world average, so it cannot be stated that Russia’s export structure is favourable from the viewpoint of the magnitude of the depreciation’s positive impact. The analysis of Russia’s non-oil-and-gas exports dynamics measured in constant prices, shows that in recent years, the growth rates undershot the modeled ones. According to the net exports dynamics, in 2014–2015, this discrepancy was offset by the fact that the import contraction rates were significantly higher than the modeled ones. In 2016, however, the contribution of “additional” (as compared to the model) net exports fell to zero. The analysis also demonstrates that in the medium term, low quality of the institutional environment in Russia hinders maintaining momentum for exports and import substitution associated with the depreciation. Thus, despite the significance of the currently in-progress measures promoting non-commodity exports and import substitution, they should be complemented by constant efforts aimed at reducing investment risks, enhancing quality of governance, and safeguarding competition.

Exchange rate fluctuations, firm size, and export behavior: an empirical investigation

In this paper, we examine how changes in the exchange rate and its volatility affect the export behavior of manufacturing firms. We also investigate whether both exchange rate changes and exchange rate volatility affect firms of different sizes differently. Applying the two-step system generalized method of moment estimator on our data for a sample of 221 Pakistani manufacturing firms, we find that the real exchange rate depreciation has positive impacts, whereas the exchange rate volatility has negative impacts on firms’ exports. We also find that compared to large-sized firms, small- and medium-sized exporting firms are more likely to benefit from currency depreciations. Yet, regarding the effect of exchange rate volatility, we find that the adverse impact of exchange rate volatility is weaker for large-sized firms as compared to small- and medium-sized firms. Our findings confirm the presence of nonlinearity in export-deterring (favoring) effects of exchange rate volatility (depreciation) on exporting behavior depending on firm size. Pakistan should design and implement export-favoring preferential policies by emphasizing on real exchange rate stabilization and providing incentives to large firms to come into being. Small- and medium-sized enterprises should develop such export strategies that help reduce their size disadvantages, particularly in managing exchange rate risks.

The Impact of Real Exchange Rate to Trade Balance in Vietnam

This paper applies a Vector autoregression model to estimate the impact of the real exchange rate to trade balance in Vietnam by using monthly data from Jan 2008 to Jan 2012. The results include three main findings: (i) There does not exist evidence of a relationship among real effective exchange rate, trade balance and domestic output, (ii) the J-curve pattern is invalid for the case of Vietnam and the depreciation of real exchange rate in Vietnam impacts negatively on the trade balance, (iii) the real exchange rate does not comprise significantly in determining the variations of the trade balance.

Testing the Marshall-Lerner condition between the U.S. and other G7 member countries

This paper examines the Marshall-Lerner condition for the six bilateral trade balances between the U.S. and Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, and the U.K. from 1985 to 2016. The main contribution of this paper is that it tests for and incorporates nonlinearity into the balance of trade equation of Boyd, Caporale, and Smith (2001). My results indicate that price elasticities for exports and imports hardly satisfy the Marshall-Lerner condition in either of the two regimes. This means that higher real exchange rate depreciation may not necessarily improve the U.S. bilateral trade balance with all of the other G7 member countries.