We analyze a two-country economy with complete markets, featuring two national currencies as well as a global (crypto)currency. If the global currency is used in both countries, the national nominal interest rates must be equal and the exchange rate between the national currencies is a risk-...

This paper studies the role of stabilization policy in a model where firm entry responds to shocks and uncertainty. We evaluate stabilization policy in the context of a simple analytically solvable sticky price model, where firms have to prepay a fixed cost of entry. The presence of endogenous...

The following arguments are developed: (i) models without monetary aggregates do not imply that inflation is a non-monetary phenomenon and are not necessarily non-monetary models; (ii) theoretical considerations suggest that such models are misspecified, but the quantitative significance of this...

In a novel model of an endowment economy, we analyze coexistence and competition between traditional fiat money (Dollar) and another intrinsically worthless medium of exchange, not controlled by a central bank, such as Bitcoin. Agents can trade consumption goods in either currency or hold on to...

The rise of digital currencies may result in domestic parallel currencies. Their exchange rate shocks will present a new challenge for monetary policy. We analyze these issues in a New Keynesian framework, where firms can set prices in one of the available currencies. Price rigidity translates a...

The strong monetary policy actions undertaken by advanced economies' central banks have led to complaints of “currency wars” by some emerging market economies, and to widespread demands for more macroeconomic policy coordination. This paper revisits these issues. It concludes that, while...

Central banking in an age of digital currencies is a fast-developing topic in monetary economics. Algorithmic digital currencies such as bitcoin appear to be viable competitors to central bank fiat currency, and their presence in the marketplace may pressure central banks to pursue tighter...

We propose a simple model of the international monetary system. We study the world supply and demand for reserve assets denominated in different currencies under a variety of scenarios: a Hegemon vs. a multipolar world; abundant vs. scarce reserve assets; a gold exchange standard vs. a floating...

Can competition among privately issued fiat currencies such as Bitcoin or Ethereum work? Only sometimes. To show this, we build a model of competition among privately issued fiat currencies. We modify the current workhorse of monetary economics, the Lagos-Wright environment, by including...

Bimetallism disappeared as a monetary regime in the 1870s. Flandreau (1996) clearly demonstrates that French bimetallism would have been able to withstand the German de-monetization of silver. Could it have withstood if many other countries in the world moved to the gold standard following in...