IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/chb/bcchwp/966.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Monetary Policy in Small Open Economies and the International Zero Lower Bound

Author

Listed:
  • Marco Rojas

Abstract

How does the zero lower bound (ZLB) on the international interest rate affect monetary policy in small open economies (SOE)? When the Fed’s rate was at the ZLB (2008-2015), data for several SOE show a significantly lower correlation between interest rates and inflation, which is at odds with the empirical regularity. This is explained in a model where the distribution of shocks that affect SOE changes when the international interest rate hits the ZLB. Two opposing channels affect the exchange rate. At the ZLB, the depreciating channel is amplified, while the appreciating channel is attenuated. Then, the SOE currency depreciates more than in a scenario without ZLB. This passes through to inflation, which affects SOE’s ability to stabilize the economy as it cannot lower its interest rate as much. In an estimated model, this mechanism by itself can explain 26 percent of the lower correlation observed in the data.

Suggested Citation

  • Marco Rojas, 2022. "Monetary Policy in Small Open Economies and the International Zero Lower Bound," Working Papers Central Bank of Chile 966, Central Bank of Chile.
    • Handle: RePEc:chb:bcchwp:966
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.bcentral.cl/documents/33528/133326/DTBC_966.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mauricio Ulate, 2021. "Going Negative at the Zero Lower Bound: The Effects of Negative Nominal Interest Rates," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 111(1), pages 1-40, January.
    2. Justiniano, Alejandro & Preston, Bruce, 2010. "Can structural small open-economy models account for the influence of foreign disturbances?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(1), pages 61-74, May.
    3. Corsetti, Giancarlo & Mavroeidi, Eleonora & Thwaites, Gregory & Wolf, Martin, 2019. "Step away from the zero lower bound: Small open economies in a world of secular stagnation," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 88-102.
    4. Nakata, Taisuke, 2016. "Optimal fiscal and monetary policy with occasionally binding zero bound constraints," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 220-240.
    5. Hettig, Thomas & Müller, Gernot J., 2018. "Fiscal policy coordination in currency unions at the effective lower bound," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 80-98.
    6. David Cook & Michael B. Devereux, 2013. "Sharing the Burden: Monetary and Fiscal Responses to a World Liquidity Trap," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 5(3), pages 190-228, July.
    7. Lopez, Jose A. & Rose, Andrew K. & Spiegel, Mark M., 2020. "Why have negative nominal interest rates had such a small effect on bank performance? Cross country evidence," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).
    8. Ruge-Murcia, Francisco, 2012. "Estimating nonlinear DSGE models by the simulated method of moments: With an application to business cycles," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 36(6), pages 914-938.
    9. Vicondoa, Alejandro, 2019. "Monetary news in the United States and business cycles in emerging economies," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 79-90.
    10. David R. Baqaee & Emmanuel Farhi & Kunal Sangani, 2024. "The Supply-Side Effects of Monetary Policy," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 132(4), pages 1065-1112.
    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. Onofri, Marco & Peersman, Gert & Smets, Frank, 2023. "The effectiveness of a negative interest rate policy," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 140(C), pages 16-33.
    2. Grzegorz Wesołowski & Oleg Gurshev, 2025. "US macroeconomic shocks and international business cycle," Working Papers 2025-06, Faculty of Economic Sciences, University of Warsaw.
    3. Javier Bianchi & Louphou Coulibaly, 2021. "Liquidity Traps, Prudential Policies, and International Spillovers," Working Papers 780, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
    4. Equiza-Goñi, Juan & Faraglia, Elisa & Oikonomou, Rigas, 2023. "Union debt management," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 130(C).
    5. Jeanne, Olivier, 2021. "Currency Wars, Trade Wars and Global Demand," Economics Working Paper Archive 66667, The Johns Hopkins University,Department of Economics.
    6. David Cook & Michael B Devereux, 2019. "Fiscal Policy in a Currency Union at the Zero Lower Bound," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 51(S1), pages 43-82, December.
    7. Nicolas Reigl & Karsten Staehr, 2020. "Negative Interest Rates in the Five Eurozone Countries from Central and Eastern Europe," CESifo Forum, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 21(01), pages 24-30, April.
    8. Shunsuke Haba & Yuichiro Ito & Yoshiyasu Kasai, 2025. "The Impact of Negative Interest Rate Policy on Interest Rate Formation and Lending," Bank of Japan Working Paper Series 25-E-1, Bank of Japan.
    9. Grandi, Pietro & Guille, Marianne, 2023. "Banks, deposit rigidity and negative rates," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 133(C).
    10. Altavilla, Carlo & Burlon, Lorenzo & Giannetti, Mariassunta & Holton, Sarah, 2022. "Is there a zero lower bound? The effects of negative policy rates on banks and firms," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 144(3), pages 885-907.
    11. Giancarlo Corsetti & Keith Kuester & Gernot J. Müller, 2017. "Fixed on Flexible: Rethinking Exchange Rate Regimes after the Great Recession," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 65(3), pages 586-632, August.
    12. Boungou, Whelsy & Hubert, Paul, 2021. "The channels of banks’ response to negative interest rates," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 131(C).
    13. Rafael Repullo, 2020. "The Reversal Interest Rate. A Critical Review," Working Papers wp2020_2021, CEMFI.
    14. Mark M. Spiegel, 2025. "The Bank Lending Channel Is Back," Working Paper Series 2025-04, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.
    15. Spiegel, Mark M., 2022. "Monetary policy spillovers under COVID-19: Evidence from lending by U.S. foreign bank subsidiaries," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).
    16. Fuster, Andreas & Schelling, Tan & Towbin, Pascal, 2024. "Tiers of joy? Reserve tiering and bank behavior in a negative-rate environment," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 148(C).
    17. Luis Brandao-Marques & Marco Casiraghi & Gaston Gelos & Gunes Kamber & Roland Meeks, 2021. "Negative Interest Rate Policies: Taking Stock of the Experience So Far," CESifo Forum, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 22(06), pages 27-32, November.
    18. Anthony Brassil, 2022. "The Consequences of Low Interest Rates for the Australian Banking Sector," RBA Annual Conference Papers acp2022-04, Reserve Bank of Australia, revised Dec 2022.
    19. Corsetti, Giancarlo & Kuester, Keith & Müller, Gernot J., 2017. "Fixed on flexible rethink exchange rate regimes after the Great Recession," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 86154, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    20. Demiralp, Selva & Eisenschmidt, Jens & Vlassopoulos, Thomas, 2021. "Negative interest rates, excess liquidity and retail deposits: Banks’ reaction to unconventional monetary policy in the euro area," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:chb:bcchwp:966. 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: Alvaro Castillo (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/bccgvcl.html .

    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.