Since the establishment in 1979 of the Exchange Rate Mechanism of the EMS a number of countries, after entry, have experienced a substantial and persistent rise in their real exchange rate (the ratio of domestic to foreign prices). This paper explains this phenomenon in terms of a `peso problem'...

When the 1987 general elections brought a durable government to Portugal, the national environment was still inflationary. Nevertheless, thanks to the efforts of successive ministers of finance/central bank governor pairs, the criteria for Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) were met and the...

This paper addresses the issue of the transition from Stage Two of EMU to Stage Three. The criteria established in the Maastricht Treaty for this transition include an ERM qualification. Under this criterion a participating country would have had to maintain its position in the normal bands of...

Using the recent EC Commission report `One Market, One Money' as a point of reference, we consider the merits of a single currency in Europe. The main benefit is the reduction in transaction costs, which the report estimates at 0.4% of European Community (EC) GDP (but much less in countries with...

In this paper we solve a particular type of stochastic process switching problem where the terminal date is fixed but the terminal price may depend on past prices. We apply this framework to the effect of various conversion modalities currently discussed on exchange rate dynamics in the...

This paper analyses the constraints European Union law places on the 1 January 1999 choices of irrevocably fixed conversion rates between the euro and the currencies of EMU members states. Current EU legislation, notably the Maastricht Treaty, requires that the bilateral currency conversion...

The paper provides SVAR estimates for four open economies: the UK, Canada, Sweden and Denmark, making explicit a monetary policy reaction function and taking account of exchange rate targeting practices. The object of the analysis is to examine the idea that an independent money and exchange...

In the first decade of its existence the EMS passed through three phases of realignments: full accommodation, partial accommodation and zero accommodation of inflation differentials. To what extent, however, does the new freedom of capital movements within the EC rule out such gradual...

We provide evidence on the fit of the New Phillips Curve (NPC) for the Euro area over the period 1970–1998, and use it as a tool to compare the characteristics of European inflation dynamics with those observed in the U.S. We also analyse the factors underlying inflation inertia by examining...

In this paper we study the relationship between labour market institutions and monetary policy. We use a simple macroeconomic framework to show how optimal monetary policy rules depend on labour institutions (labour adjustment costs, and nominal and real wage rigidity) and social preferences...