Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Foreign Exchange Intervention and the Political Business Cycle : A Panel Data Analysis

Contents:

Author Info

Abstract

By combining expansionary open market operations with sales of foreign exchange, the central bank can expand the monetary base without depreciating the exchange rate. Thus, if there is a monetary political business cycle, sales of foreign exchange are especially likely before elections. Our panel data analysis for up to 146 countries in 1975-2001 supports this hypothesis. Foreign exchange reserves relative to trend GDP depend negatively on the preelection index. The relationship is significant and robust irrespective of the type of electoral variable, the choice of control variables and the estimation technique.

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
File URL: http://www.kof.ethz.ch/publications/science/pdf/wp_159.pdf
Download Restriction: no

Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by KOF Swiss Economic Institute, ETH Zurich in its series KOF Working papers with number 07-159.

as in new window
Length: 28 pages
Date of creation: Apr 2007
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:kof:wpskof:07-159

Contact details of provider:
Postal: Weinbergstrasse 35, CH-8092 Zürich
Phone: +41 44 632 41 28
Fax: +41 44 632 12 18
Email:
Web page: http://www.kof.ethz.ch
More information through EDIRC

Related research

Keywords: Foreign exchange interventions; political business cycles;

Other versions of this item:

Find related papers by JEL classification:

This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

References

References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
as in new window
  1. Axel Dreher & Bernhard Herz & Volker Karb, 2005. "Is There a Causal Link between Currency and Debt Crisis?," TWI Research Paper Series 3, Thurgauer Wirtschaftsinstitut, Universität Konstanz.
  2. Arellano, Manuel & Bond, Stephen, 1991. "Some Tests of Specification for Panel Data: Monte Carlo Evidence and an Application to Employment Equations," Review of Economic Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 58(2), pages 277-97, April.
  3. Alesina, Alberto F & Cohen, Gerald D & Roubini, Nouriel, 1992. "Macroeconomic Policy and Elections in OECD Democracies," CEPR Discussion Papers 608, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  4. Rob Roy McGregor, 1996. "Fomc Voting Behavior And Electoral Cycles: Partisan Ideology And Partisan Loyalty," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 8(1), pages 17-32, 03.
  5. Alesina, Alberto & Devleeschauwer, Arnaud & Wacziarg, Romain & Kurlat, Sergio & Easterly, William, 2003. "Fractionalization," Scholarly Articles 4553003, Harvard University Department of Economics.
  6. Beck, T.H.L. & Clarke, G. & Groff, A. & Keefer , P. & Walsh, P., 2001. "New tools in comparative political economy: The database of political institutions," Open Access publications from Tilburg University urn:nbn:nl:ui:12-3125517, Tilburg University.
  7. Joshua Aizenman & Nancy Marion, 2004. "International Reserve Holdings with Sovereign Risk and Costly Tax Collection," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 114(497), pages 569-591, 07.
  8. Fatum, Rasmus & Hutchison, Michael M., 2003. "Effectiveness of Official Daily Foreign Exchange Market Intervention Operations in Japan," Santa Cruz Center for International Economics, Working Paper Series qt2883n7z5, Center for International Economics, UC Santa Cruz.
  9. Arellano, Manuel & Bover, Olympia, 1995. "Another look at the instrumental variable estimation of error-components models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1), pages 29-51, July.
  10. Bernard Laurens & Marco Arnone & Jean-François Segalotto, 2006. "The Measurement of Central Bank Autonomy: Survey of Models, Indicators, and Empirical Evidence," IMF Working Papers 06/227, International Monetary Fund.
  11. Vaubel, Roland, 1997. "The bureaucratic and partisan behavior of independent central banks: German and international evidence," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 13(2), pages 201-224, May.
  12. Philip Lane & Dominic Burke, 2001. "The Empirics of Foreign Reserves," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 12(4), pages 423-434, October.
  13. Alberto Alesina & Gerald D. Cohen & Nouriel Roubini, 1992. "Macroeconomic Policy And Elections In Oecd Democracies," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 4(1), pages 1-30, 03.
  14. Grimes, Arthur, 1993. "International Reserves under Floating Exchanges Rates: Two Paradoxes Explained," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 69(207), pages 411-15, December.
  15. Richard Blundell & Steve Bond, 1995. "Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel data models," IFS Working Papers W95/17, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
  16. Carlsen, Fredrik, 1997. " Opinion Polls and Political Business Cycles: Theory and Evidence for the United States," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 92(3-4), pages 387-406, September.
  17. repec:rus:hseeco:181565 is not listed on IDEAS
  18. Frenkel, Jacob A & Jovanovic, Boyan, 1981. "Optimal International Reserves: A Stochastic Framework," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 91(362), pages 507-14, June.
  19. Nickell, Stephen J, 1981. "Biases in Dynamic Models with Fixed Effects," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 49(6), pages 1417-26, November.
  20. M. Bahmani-Oskooee & F. Brown, 2002. "Demand for international reserves: a review article," Applied Economics, Taylor and Francis Journals, vol. 34(10), pages 1209-1226.
  21. Axel Dreher, 2004. "The Influence of IMF Programs on the Re-election of Debtor Governments," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 16(1), pages 53-76, 03.
  22. Joshua Aizenman & Nancy Marion, 2002. "The high demand for international reserves in the Far East: what's going on?," Pacific Basin Working Paper Series 02-08, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.
  23. Aizenman, Joshua & Marion, Nancy, 2003. "The high demand for international reserves in the Far East: What is going on?," Journal of the Japanese and International Economies, Elsevier, vol. 17(3), pages 370-400, September.
  24. Reinhart, Carmen & Rogoff, Kenneth, 2004. "The modern history of exchange rate arrangements: A reinterpretation," MPRA Paper 14070, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  25. Adi Brender & Allan Drazen, 2005. "How Do Budget Deficits and Economic Growth Affect Reelection Prospects? Evidence from a Large Cross-Section of Countries," NBER Working Papers 11862, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  26. Beck, Thorsten & Clarke, George & Groff, Alberto & Keefer, Philip & Walsh, Patrick, 2000. "New tools and new tests in comparative political economy - the database of political institutions," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2283, The World Bank.
  27. Alex Cukierman, 1992. "Central Bank Strategy, Credibility, and Independence: Theory and Evidence," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262031981.
  28. Soh, Byung Hee, 1986. "Political Business Cycles in Industrialized Democratic Countries," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 39(1), pages 31-46.
  29. Axel Dreher & Roland Vaubel, 2004. "Do IMF and IBRD Cause Moral Hazard and Political Business Cycles? Evidence from Panel Data," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 15(1), pages 5-22, January.
  30. Berger, Helge & Woitek, Ulrich, 1997. " Searching for Political Business Cycles in Germany," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 91(2), pages 179-97, April.
  31. Rasmus Fatum & Michael Hutchison, 2002. "Effectiveness of official daily foreign exchange market intervention operations in Japan," Pacific Basin Working Paper Series 03-01, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.
  32. Windmeijer, Frank, 2005. "A finite sample correction for the variance of linear efficient two-step GMM estimators," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 126(1), pages 25-51, May.
  33. Edwards, Sebastian, 1985. "On the interest-rate elasticity of the demand for international reserves: Some evidence from developing countries," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 4(2), pages 287-295, June.
  34. Cohen, Gerald & Alesina, Alberto & Roubini, Nouriel, 1992. "Macroeconomic Policy and Elections in OECD Democracies," Scholarly Articles 4553023, Harvard University Department of Economics.
  35. Williamson, John, 1976. " Exchange-Rate Flexibility and Reserve Use," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 78(2), pages 327-39.
Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

Citations

Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
as in new window

Cited by:
  1. Dreher, Axel & Gassebner, Martin & Siemers, Lars-H. R., 2010. "Globalization, economic freedom and human rights," Center for European, Governance and Economic Development Research Discussion Papers 115, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
  2. Ansgar Belke & Niklas Potrafke, 2009. "Does Government Ideology Matter in Monetary Policy? – A Panel Data Analysis for OECD Countries," Ruhr Economic Papers 0094, Rheinisch-Westfälisches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universität Dortmund, Universität Duisburg-Essen.
  3. Andreas Steiner, 2010. "The Accumulation of Foreign Exchange by Central Banks: Fear of Capital Mobility?," Working Papers 85, Institute of Empirical Economic Research.
  4. Dreher, Axel & Sturm, Jan-Egbert & Haan, Jakob de, 2010. "When is a central bank governor replaced? Evidence based on a new data set," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 766-781, September.
  5. Dreher, Axel & Gassebner, Martin & Siemers, Lars-H. R., 2010. "Globalization, economic freedom and human rights," Center for European, Governance and Economic Development Research Discussion Papers 115, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
  6. Axel Dreher & Silvia Marchesi & James Raymond Vreeland, 2007. "The Politics of IMF Forecasts," CESifo Working Paper Series 2129, CESifo Group Munich.
  7. Axel Dreher & Martin Gassebner & Lars-H. R. Siemers, 2007. "Does Terror Threaten Human Rights? Evidence from Panel Data," CESifo Working Paper Series 1935, CESifo Group Munich.

Lists

This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

Statistics

Access and download statistics

Corrections

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kof:wpskof:07-159

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: ().

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 references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link 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 profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

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