During the 1990's the Japanese yen proved astonishingly strong despite the persisting recession. This paper tracks the origins of the high yen. It analyses the influence of interest rates, prices and foreign exchange policy on the yen-dollar exchange rate. It comes to the conclusion that real...

The paper analyses the causality between the Japanese-US relative export prices and the yen-dollar exchange rate. It explains why the Japanese yen proved strong even during the economic slump of the 1990s. The paper suggests that the appreciation of the Japanese yen forced the Japanese...

The IMF classifications of the Central and Eastern European exchange rate arrangements are heterogeneous. While one group of countries reports tight pegs to the euro, a second group seems to have moved toward (more) exchange rate flexibility. Based on the recent discussion about the accuracy of...

A series of crises and emergency interest rate cuts has brought global interest rates towards zero and government debt to historical records. The paper discusses the exit options from unconventional monetary policies and unsustainable government debt. First, the paper sheds light on the...

The 2010 European debt crisis has revived the discussion concerning the optimum adjustment strategy in the face of asymmetric shocks. Whereas Mundell's (1961) seminal theory on optimum currency areas suggests depreciation in the face of crisis, the most recent emergence of competitive...

We argue that criticism concerning the Chinese dollar peg is misplaced as no predictable link exists between the exchange rate and the trade balance of an international creditor economy. The stable nominal yuan/dollar rate is argued to have stabilized Chinese, East Asian and global growth....

After the eastern enlargement of the European Union (EU) and due to increasing labor market integration, wage determination in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) has become a key issue in European economic policy making. In addition, a controversial discussion concerning the monetary integration...

The paper analyses the monetary policy operations of central banks in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). We distinguish the pattern of monetary policy operations of the liquidity providing central banks of the large industrialized countries (creditor central banks) and the liquidity...

The paper discusses global imbalances under the aspect of an asymmetric world monetary system. It identifies the US and euro area (Germany) as center countries with rising current account deficits (US) and surpluses (Germany) which are matched by respective current account surpluses of...

A series of crisis and emergency interest rate cuts has brought global interest rates towards zero and government debt to historical records. The paper discusses the exit options from unconventional monetary policies and unsustainable government debt. First, the paper sheds light on the...