Exchange rate flexibility in Latin America

Purpose – Exchange rate regime decisively impacts key policy objectives such as financial stability, inflation control, etc. The purpose of this paper is to overview the evolution of exchange rate regimes spanning 12 nations in the Latin American region over the last two decades and estimate the degrees of influence of other major currencies on each nation. Design/methodology/approach – Using the methodology developed by Frankel and Wei, the de facto extent of exchange rate flexibility is discerned for these nations and put into perspective with that of the IMF exchange rate regime classifications. Findings – An increase in flexibility is found from the 1990s to the 2000s, especially for inflation targeting nations. However, the results reveal these nations adopt a policy of “guarded caution” and follow more of a de facto managed floating regime that is far from pure floats. The smaller economies of the region still pursue more fixed regimes. While the results correlate, to an extent, with the IMF's classifications, several areas of discrepancy are noted. The findings are robust to several sensitivity analyses. Originality/value – A discrepancy between the IMF regime categorization and the true regime a country actually follows may cause IMF financial assistance programs to be less effective. Do countries follow regimes they are classified into? The present study gleans deeper into the issue and discerns this. The comparative analysis includes the relatively larger economies of the region as well as the seldom researched smaller ones.