This paper seeks to quantify existing financial barriers among East African Community (EAC) member countries based on analysis of each member country’s foreign exchange market. The primary contribution of this paper is the generation of an aggregate measure of financial barriers for the...

The Great Recession affected export and import patterns in our sample countries, and these changes, coupled with a more volatile external environment, have profound impact on our estimates of real exchange rate misalignments and projections of sustainable real exchange rates. We find that real...

This paper applies intertemporal models of precautionary saving to compute an optimal level of international reserves for The Gambia. The analysis focuses on current account shocks specific to a low-income economy with a significant import component and complements a more standard, rule-of-thumb...

ASEAN countries have deliberated on the feasibility of a monetary union that seeks to set a common currency in the region. This is in accordance with the second declaration of the Bali Concord reaffirming the intention toward economic cooperation and integration. This study investigates the...

We consider Korea and Japan in East Asia as the representative country of each of the two groups: high- versus low-depreciation economies during the 2008 global financial crisis. Although the two countries have geographical and industrial similarities, their exchange rate change during the...

Countries hold foreign currency reserves to support and influence exchange rate. This paper examines the causal relationship between exchange rate and reserves in six Asian countries. We obtain divergent evidence regarding the long-run and stable relationship between reserves and exchange rate...

Applying a general functional form, the Marshall-Lerner condition of the bilateral trade between the US and Hong Kong, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, Singapore, or Thailand is examined. In deriving the real exchange rate, both the relative consumer price index (CPI) and producer price...