This paper compares the impact of shocks to U.S. interest rates and emerging market bond spreads on domestic interest rates and exchange rates across several emerging market economies with different exchange rate regimes. Consistent with conventional priors, the results indicate that interest rates in Hong Kong react much more to U.S. interest rate shocks and shocks to international risk premia than interest rates in Singapore. The results are less clearcut in the comparison of Argentina and Mexico: while interest rates (and the exchange rate) in Mexico seem to react less to U.S. interest rate shocks, they react about the same to bond spread shocks, in addition to a significant impact on the exchange rate.

Financial globalisation has made the formulation of monetary policy in emerging market economies increasingly complicated. This timely set of studies looks at the turmoil in global financial markets, which, coupled with volatile inflation, poses serious challenges for central banks in these countries. The book features a number of specially commissioned new papers from both front-line policymakers and researchers in developing and emerging market economies, which tackle the difficult issues currently being debated with increasing urgency by monetary policy theorists and policymakers around the world. They address questions such as: What monetary policy framework is most suitable for emerging market countries to confront the new challenges while they continue to open up to trade and financial flows? , What are the linkages between monetary stability and financial stability? and Is inflation targeting or a fixed exchange rate regime preferable for developing and emerging markets? Providing unique insights on the interaction between the theory and practice of monetary policy in emerging markets, this book will be of great interest to academics and students of economics, economic policy and development economics. Policymakers will also find this to be a useful and thought-provoking read.

Central banks in emerging and developing economies (EMDEs) have been modernizing their monetary policy frameworks, often moving toward inflation targeting (IT). However, questions regarding the strength of monetary policy transmission from interest rates to inflation and output have often stalled progress. We conduct a novel empirical analysis using Jordà’s (2005) approach for 40 EMDEs to shed a light on monetary transmission in these countries. We find that interest rate hikes reduce output growth and inflation, once we explicitly account for the behavior of the exchange rate. Having a modern monetary policy framework—adopting IT and independent and transparent central banks—matters more for monetary transmission than financial development.

The book examines monetary policy frameworks in emerging markets, focusing on central bank independence, the monetary policy strategy, and the exchange rate regime. The research applies quantitative empirical analysis and in-depth case studies on Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon. The empirical analysis investigats: the phenomenon of 'fear of floating' and the correlation between exchange rate and macroeconomic volatility; the degree of monetary policy independence in emerging markets in the context of their increased integration in the global economic system; and the degree of central bank independence and how it influences both 'fear of floating' and monetary policy independence. The results highlight the impact of central bank independence on the other aspects of the monetary framework, as it mitigates fear of floating and contributes to increased monetary policy independence of world interest rates in emerging markets. The conclusions that emerge from the cases suggest that central bank independence is critical in achieving exchange rate and price stability and point to the benefits of proactively managing the exchange rate regime.

An overview of the financial vulnerability of emerging market economies and how the impact of exchange rate regimes affects this vulnerability.

This paper investigates the effects of the adoption of inflation targeting (IT) on the choice of exchange rate regime in emerging markets (EMs), conditional on certain macroeconomic conditions. Using a large sample of EMs and after controlling for the selection bias associated with the adoption of IT, we find that IT countries on average have a relatively more flexible exchange rate regime than other EMs. However, the flexibility of the exchange rate regime shows strong heterogeneity among IT countries depending on their degree of openness and exposure to FX risks. Moreover, we find that the marginal effect of IT adoption on the exchange rate flexibility increases with the duration of the IT regime in place, and with the propensity scores to adopt it.

Hikes in U.S. interest rates in 1999-2000 have started to spill over to other economies' interest rates, which in many countries have risen to reflect the higher U.S. rates. Are countries with flexible exchange rates better able to isolate their domestic interest rates from this type of negative international shock? Less and less so, as economies become more integrated.