Volatile exchange rates and how to manage them are a contentious topic whenever economic policymakers gather in international meetings. This book examines the broad parameters of exchange rate policy in light of both high-powered theory and real-world experience. What are the costs and benefits of flexible versus fixed exchange rates? How much of a role should the exchange rate play in monetary policy? Why don't volatile exchange rates destabilize inflation and output? The principal finding of this book is that using monetary policy to fight exchange rate volatility, including through the adoption of a fixed exchange rate regime, leads to greater volatility of employment, output, and inflation. In other words, the "cure" for exchange rate volatility is worse than the disease. This finding is demonstrated in economic models, in historical case studies, and in statistical analysis of the data. The book devotes considerable attention to understanding the reasons why volatile exchange rates do not destabilize inflation and output. The book concludes that many countries would benefit from allowing greater flexibility of their exchange rates in order to target monetary policy at stabilization of their domestic economies. Few, if any, countries would benefit from a move in the opposite direction.

This book describes the remarkable path which led to the Swiss Franc becoming the strong international currency that it is today. Ernst Baltensperger and Peter Kugler use Swiss monetary history to provide valuable insights into a number of issues concerning the organization and development of monetary institutions and currency that shaped the structure of financial markets and affected the economic course of a country in important ways. They investigate a number of topics, including the functioning of a world without a central bank, the role of competition and monopoly in money and banking, the functioning of monetary unions, monetary policy of small open economies under fixed and flexible exchange rates, the stability of money demand and supply under different monetary regimes, and the monetary and macroeconomic effects of Swiss Banking and Finance. Swiss Monetary History since the Early 19th Century illustrates the value of monetary history for understanding financial markets and macroeconomics today.

The work takes into consideration ONLY a particular field (cut) of monetary policy that regards the historical context of the monetary debate on fixed versus flexible exchange rates from the early fifties (of the 20th century) to the recent years, or exactly from the ?case for a flexible exchange rates? to the creation of ?optimum currency areas? and monetary unions and the most recent events of the financial crisis in the 1990s and the unconventional monetary policies used during and after the 2008-9 financial crisis. A number of tables and charts will help the reader have a clear idea about the advantages and disadvantages of having a fixed and flexible exchange rates system. The fundamental idea that has pushed me to choose this object of study moves from that relation always complex and changing between the factors and aspects that have heated up the monetary debate on fixed versus flexible exchange rates for decades and how the countries have chosen the right system based on their specific conditions and macroeconomic structure. This research among others focuses on the monetary crises that occurred in the 1990s and early 2000s where several countries in Asia, Europe, and Latin America experienced some unprecedented currency crisis as a result of the effects of quick liberalization and globalization. Moreover it illustrates also some of the factors the contributed to the 2008 financial crisis that hit the U.S. and Eurozone and the post monetary events of the crisis. The financial crisis of 2008-9 demonstrated that unconventional monetary policies can be used to fix part of the economy in recession. In fact, a number of central banks in industrialized countries were forced to pursue unconventional monetary policies such a quantitative easing, very low interest rates, and escape from balance sheet recession to input money in the system and keep the economy running. The Brexit event in Europe with all it consequences is another topic that will be explored in this work.

Most European countries are rather small, yet we know little about their monetary history. This book analyses for the first time the experience of seven small states (Austria, Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland) during the last hundred years, starting with the restoration of the gold standard after World War I and ending with Sweden's rejection of the Euro in 2003. The comparative analysis shows that for the most part of the twentieth century the options of policy makers were seriously constrained by a distinct fear of floating exchange rates. Only with the crisis of the European Monetary System (EMS) in 1992-93 did the idea that a flexible exchange rate regime was suited for a small open economy gain currency. The book also analyses the differences among small states and concludes that economic structures or foreign policy orientations were far more important for the timing of regime changes than domestic institutions and policies.

''In summary, the book is valuable as a textbook both at the advanced undergraduate level and at the graduate level. It is also very useful for the economist who wants to be brought up-to-date on theoretical and empirical research on exchange rate behaviour.'' ""Journal of International Economics""

China’s exchange rate regime has undergone gradual reform since the move away from a fixed exchange rate in 2005. The renminbi has become more flexible over time but is still carefully managed, and depth and liquidity in the onshore FX market is relatively low compared to other countries with de jure floating currencies. Allowing a greater role for market forces within the existing regime, and greater two-way flexibility of the exchange rate, are important steps to build on the progress already made. This should be complemented by further steps to develop the FX market, improve FX risk management, and modernize the monetary policy framework.

The recent financial crisis has troubled the US, Europe, and beyond, and is indicative of the integrated world in which we live. Today, transactions take place with the use of foreign currencies, and their values affect the nations' economies and their citizens' welfare. Exchange Rates and International Financial Economics provides readers with the historic, theoretical, and practical knowledge of these relative prices among currencies. While much of the previous work on the topic has been simply descriptive or theoretical, Kallianiotis gives a unique and intimate understanding of international exchange rates and their place in an increasingly globalized world.