Are fiscal spillovers today as large as they were during the global financial crisis? How do they depend on economic and policy conditions? This note informs the debate on the cross-border impact of fiscal policy on economic activity, shedding light on the magnitude and the factors affecting transmission, such as the fiscal instruments used, cyclical positions, monetary policy conditions, and exchange rate regimes. The note assesses spillovers from five major advanced economies (France, Germany, Japan, United Kingdom, United States) on 55 advanced and emerging market economies that represent 85 percent of global output, looking at government-spending and tax revenue shocks during expansion and consolidation episodes. It finds that fiscal spillovers are economically significant in the presence of slack and/or accommodative monetary policy—and considerably smaller otherwise, which suggests that spillovers are large when domestic multipliers are also large. It also finds that spillovers from government-spending shocks are larger and more persistent than those from tax shocks and that transmission may be stronger among countries with fixed exchange rates. The evidence suggests that although spillovers from fiscal policies in the current environment may not be as large as they were during the crisis, they may still be important under certain economic circumstances.

The paper assesses the impact of fiscal spillovers on growth in the context of a coordinated exit from crisis management policies. We find that despite potentially sizeable domestic effects from consolidation, aggregate negative spillovers to other countries are likely to be contained in 2011-2012 unless fiscal multipliers and/or imports elasticities are very large. Small and open European economies, however, will be substantially affected in any case. In contrast, the coordinated exit from fiscal stimulus will have limited direct effect on European peripheral countries since they are relatively closed, with the notable exception of Ireland.

We estimate a panel VAR model that captures cross-country, dynamic interlinkages for 10 euro area countries using quarterly data for the period 1999-2016. Our analysis suggests that fiscal spillovers are significant and tend to be larger for countries with close trade and financial links as well, as for fiscal shocks originating from larger countries. The current account appears to be the main channel of transmission, although strong trade integration among countries in the euro area and spillback effects tend to zero-out the net trade impact in some cases. A subsample analysis shows that the effects of fiscal policy have changed over time, with larger estimated domestic multipliers and spillovers between 2011 and 2014.

Although China’s much-needed transition to a new growth path is proceeding broadly as expected, the transition is still fraught with uncertainty, including regarding the Chinese authorities’ ability to achieve a smooth rebalancing of growth and the extent of the attendant slowdown in activity. Thus, in the short run, the transition process is likely to entail significant spillovers through trade and commodities, and possibly financial channels. This note sheds some light on the size and nature of financial spillovers from China by looking at the impact of developments in China on global financial markets, with a particular emphasis on differentiation across asset classes and markets. The note shows that economic and financial developments in China have a significant impact on global financial markets, but these effects reflect primarily the central role the country plays in goods trade and commodity markets, rather than China’s financial integration in global markets and the direct financial linkages it has with other countries.

This paper sheds new light on the degree of international fiscal-financial spillovers by investigating the effect of domestic fiscal policies on cross-border bank lending. By estimating the dynamic response of U.S. cross-border bank lending towards the 45 recipient countries to exogenous domestic fiscal shocks (both measured by spending and revenue) between 1990Q1 and 2012Q4, we find that expansionary domestic fiscal shocks lead to a statistically significant increase in cross-border bank lending. The magnitude of the effect is also economically significant: the effect of 1 percent of GDP increase (decrease) in spending (revenue) is comparable to an exogenous decline in the federal funds rate. We also find that fiscal shocks tend to have larger effects during periods of recessions than expansions in the source country, and that the adverse effect of a fiscal consolidation is larger than the positive effect of the same size of a fiscal expansion. In contrast, we do not find systematic and statistically significant differences in the spillover effects across recipient countries depending on their exchange rate regime, although capital controls seem to play some moderating role. The extension of the analysis to a panel of 16 small open economies confirms the finding from the U.S. economy.

This paper revisits the issue of cross-country spillovers from fiscal consolidations using an innovative empirical methodology. We find evidence in support of fiscal spillovers in 10 euro area countries. Fiscal consolidation in one country not only reduces domestic output (direct effect), but also the output of other member countries (indirect/spillover effect). Fiscal spillovers are larger for: (i) more closely located and economically integrated countries, and (ii) fiscal shocks originating from relatively larger countries. On average, 1 percent of GDP fiscal consolidation in 10 euro area countries reduces the combined output by 0.6 percent on impact, out of which half is driven by indirect effects from fiscal spillovers. The impact peters out and becomes insignificant over the medium-term. It is largely driven by tax measures, which have a relatively stronger effect on output compared to expenditure measures. The results are robust to alternative measures of bilateral links across countries.

To what extent is South Africa affected by G8 economies and BRIC growth shocks? This book identifies channels that amplify these shock effects, the relevance of third country transmission effects and the effects of the first and second rounds of US quantitative easing. The changing reactions of South African variables over time to financial shocks emanating from the US and selected countries in the Euro area, is presented. The book quantifies the effects of capital flow shocks, determines the counterfactuals of asset prices and economic growth variables, and compares the contribution of capital flows and domestic macro factors on asset prices. The effects of the exchange rate depreciation are contrasted to the decline in investment as key drivers of the trade balance. Stock market interdependence is determined amongst South African, Indian and Brazilian equities. The contributions of stock price returns and volatility on South African economic growth are contrasted. The authors construct a financial stress index for South Africa and determine how it amplifies shocks.