The volume collects the essays presented at the 15th Workshop on Public Finance organised by Banca d'Italia in Perugia from 4 to 6 April 2013. The workshop focused on the link between fiscal policy and macroeconomic imbalances and comprised four sessions. The first session concentrated on the...

Recent theoretical developments in exchange rate economics have led to important new insights into the functioning of the foreign exchange market. The simple models of the 1970s, which could not withstand empirical evaluation, have been succeeded by more complex models that draw on theoretical...

Exchange rate is one of the macroeconomic indicators that gives concern to policy makers and investors as its movements are mostly unpredictable and tend to affect both trade and capital flows. Hence, this study analyzes exchange rate volatility clustering among selected WAMZ countries for the...

The closed and open economy literatures work on evaluating the role of real rigidities, but in parallel. This paper brings the two literatures together. We use international price data and exchange rate shocks to evaluate the importance of real rigidities in price setting. We show that...

The financial turmoil that hit Russia in August 1998, was extremely confusing to many foreign observers working in Russia. It was astonishing to see a country that seemed on its way to prosperity suddenly experiencing an economic meltdown. As part of my work, I was often asked to provide...

This paper studies dynamics of endogenous business cycles and exchange rate volatility in a small open economy. Without market imperfections, domestic price and wage adjustments respond sluggishly to disequilibrium situations on real domestic markets while prices on international capital markets...

The adoption of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) in 1986 resulted in the transition from fixed exchange rate regime to floating exchange rate regime in Nigeria. Ever since, the exchange rate of naira vis-à-vis the U.S dollar has attained varying rates...

The financial turmoil that hit Russia in August 1998 was extremely confusing to many foreign observers working in Russia. It was astonishing to see a country that seemed on its way to prosperity suddenly experiencing an economic meltdown. As part of my work, I was often asked to provide...

This paper attempts to identify the sources of U.K. exchange rate and relative consumer price fluctuations between 1973 and 1994. We follow Clarida and Gali (1994) in using the Blanchard and Quah (1989) structural VAR (SVAR) method to identify the effects of three structural shocks within a...

In addition to its direct effects on the global trading and production structure, the ongoing process of globalisation may have important implications for the interaction of exchange rates and the overall economy. This paper presents evidence regarding possible changes in the role of exchange...