IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/mes/postke/v37y2015i3p481-502.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

International reserves and growth: assessing the mercantilist motive in Latin America

Author

Listed:
  • Moritz Cruz

Abstract

Official reserves have increased to unprecedented levels since the mid-1990s, particularly in developing economies. One of the reasons ascribed for accumulating official reserves is the so-called mercantilist motive. This motive is seen as a part of an active industrial policy in the sense that these resources allow the monetary authorities to maintain a stable and undervalued real exchange rate, promoting economic growth and development via the tradable goods sector. In this paper we attempt to assess this motive using data for ten selected Latin American economies during the period 1996–2011. Unlike most previous work done on this topic, we consider official reserves as one of the determinants of the real exchange rate. Our econometric findings indicate that international reserves in the region appreciate the real exchange rate. This result suggests that the strategy of hoarding reserves in Latin America has not promoted economic growth and development.

Suggested Citation

  • Moritz Cruz, 2015. "International reserves and growth: assessing the mercantilist motive in Latin America," Journal of Post Keynesian Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(3), pages 481-502, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:mes:postke:v:37:y:2015:i:3:p:481-502
    DOI: 10.1080/01603477.2015.1000176
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/01603477.2015.1000176
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/01603477.2015.1000176?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Atish R. Ghosh & Jonathan D. Ostry & Charalambos G. Tsangarides, 2017. "Shifting Motives: Explaining the Buildup in Official Reserves in Emerging Markets Since the 1980s," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 65(2), pages 308-364, June.
    2. Luca Antonio Ricci & Gian Maria Milesi-Ferretti & Jaewoo Lee, 2013. "Real Exchange Rates and Fundamentals: A Cross-Country Perspective," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 45(5), pages 845-865, August.
    3. Mr. Sunil Sharma & Woon Gyu Choi & Maria Strömqvist, 2007. "Capital Flows, Financial Integration, and International Reserve Holdings: The Recent Experience of Emerging Markets and Advanced Economies," IMF Working Papers 2007/151, International Monetary Fund.
    4. André Nassif & Carmem Feijó & Eliane Araújo, 2011. "The Long-Term “Optimal” Real Exchange Rate And The Currency Overvaluation Trend In Open Emerging Economies: The Case Of Brazil," UNCTAD Discussion Papers 206, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development.
    5. Joshua Aizenman & Michael M. Hutchison, 2010. "Exchange Market Pressure and Absorption by International Reserves: Emerging Markets and Fear of Reserve Loss During the 2008-09 Crisis," NBER Working Papers 16260, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Edwards, Sebastian, 1988. "Real and monetary determinants of real exchange rate behavior: Theory and evidence from developing countries," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(3), pages 311-341, November.
    7. Polterovich, Victor & Popov, Vladimir, 2003. "Accumulation of Foreign Exchange Reserves and Long Term Growth," MPRA Paper 20069, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Moritz Cruz, 2014. "International reserves and the mercantilist approach: some further evidence," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 34(1), pages 446-451.
    2. Dumrongrittikul, Taya & Anderson, Heather M., 2016. "How do shocks to domestic factors affect real exchange rates of Asian developing countries?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 67-85.
    3. Miss Nkunde Mwase, 2012. "How much should I hold? Reserve Adequacy in Emerging Markets and Small Islands," IMF Working Papers 2012/205, International Monetary Fund.
    4. Farid Makhlouf & Mazhar Mughal, 2013. "Remittances, Dutch Disease, And Competitiveness: A Bayesian Analysis," Journal of Economic Development, Chung-Ang Unviersity, Department of Economics, vol. 38(2), pages 67-97, June.
    5. Lone Christiansen & Alessandro Prati & Luca Antonio Ricci & Thierry Tressel, 2010. "External Balance in Low-Income Countries," NBER Chapters, in: NBER International Seminar on Macroeconomics 2009, pages 265-322, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Cheng, Gong, 2015. "A Growth Perspective On Foreign Reserve Accumulation," Macroeconomic Dynamics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 19(6), pages 1358-1379, September.
    7. A. Polbin., 2017. "Modeling the real ruble exchange rate under monetary policy regime change," VOPROSY ECONOMIKI, N.P. Redaktsiya zhurnala "Voprosy Economiki", vol. 4.
    8. Coppola,Andrea & Lagerborg,Andresa & Mustafaoglu,Zafer, 2016. "Estimating an equilibrium exchange rate for the Argentine Peso," Policy Research Working Paper Series 7682, The World Bank.
    9. Aizenman, Joshua, 2019. "A modern reincarnation of Mundell-Fleming's trilemma," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 81(C), pages 444-454.
    10. Yougbaré, Lassana, 2011. "Exchange rate arrangements and misalignments: contrasting words and deeds," MPRA Paper 32362, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. Adu, Raymond & Litsios, Ioannis & Baimbridge, Mark, 2019. "Real exchange rate and asymmetric shocks in the West African Monetary Zone (WAMZ)," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 232-249.
    12. Polbin, Andrey, 2017. "Моделирование Реального Курса Рубля В Условиях Изменения Режима Денежно-Кредитной Политики [Modeling the real ruble exchange rate under monetary policy regime change]," MPRA Paper 78139, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    13. Banerjee, Krittika & Goyal, Ashima, 2021. "Behavioural​ equilibrium real exchange rates and misalignments: Evidence from large emerging markets," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 414-436.
    14. Kimolo, Deogratius & Mrema, Stanislaus, 2019. "Real Exchange Rate Misalignments in Tanzania," MPRA Paper 114672, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    15. Couharde, Cécile & Delatte, Anne-Laure & Grekou, Carl & Mignon, Valérie & Morvillier, Florian, 2020. "Measuring the Balassa-Samuelson effect: A guidance note on the RPROD database," International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 161(C), pages 237-247.
    16. Coudert, Virginie & Couharde, Cécile & Mignon, Valérie, 2015. "On the impact of volatility on the real exchange rate – terms of trade nexus: Revisiting commodity currencies," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 110-127.
    17. Samir Jahjah & Bin Wei & Vivian Zhanwei Yue, 2013. "Exchange Rate Policy and Sovereign Bond Spreads in Developing Countries," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 45(7), pages 1275-1300, October.
    18. Muntasir Murshed & Seemran Rashid, 2020. "An Empirical Investigation of Real Exchange Rate Responses to Foreign Currency Inflows: Revisiting the Dutch Disease Phenomenon in South Asia," The Economics and Finance Letters, Conscientia Beam, vol. 7(1), pages 23-46.
    19. Janus, Thorsten & Riera-Crichton, Daniel, 2015. "Economic shocks, civil war and ethnicity," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 32-44.
    20. Mariarosaria Comunale & Markus Eller & Mathias Lahnsteiner, 2020. "Assessing credit gaps in CESEE based on levels justified by fundamentals – a comparison across different estimation approaches," Bank of Lithuania Working Paper Series 74, Bank of Lithuania.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:mes:postke:v:37:y:2015:i:3:p:481-502. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/MPKE20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.