The interaction between future binding bank net worth constraints and dynamic (future) underinvestment could lead to ex-ante overinvestment even in economies with a single monopolistic bank where there are no pecuniary externalities. The last third chapter, which is coauthored with Kenneth Rogoff, evaluates a new class of exchange rate forecasting studies, which claim that structural models are getting closer to being able to forecast exchange rates at short horizons. We argue that misinterpretation of some new out-of-sample tests for nested models, over-reliance on asymptotic test statistics, and failure to sufficiently check robustness to alternative time windows have led many studies to overstate even the relatively thin positive results that have been found.

Each of the three essays composing this dissertation investigates important economic and econometric issues in international finance and macroeconomics. The first essay, “Market Structure and the Persistence of Sectoral Deviations from Purchasing Power Parity,” examines the relationship between market structure and the persistence of the dollar-based sectoral real exchange rates for fourteen OECD countries. The empirical results based on disaggregated data suggest that differences in market structure significantly determine the rates at which deviations from sectoral purchasing power parity decay. Based on the findings, I argue that an imperfectly competitive market structure is an important source of the well-documented persistence in real exchange rates.