• East Asian Economic Review
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.115-143
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• 2023

In this paper, we address how the monetary authority should react to financial market status and exchange rate movements in a small open economy New Keynesian model with financial frictions due to asymmetric information between savers and borrowers. We show that the small economy with financial frictions is more susceptible to the exogenous shocks under the fixed exchange rate regime than under the flexible exchange regime. The small economy experiences a more prolonged and deeper economic recession under the fixed exchange rate regime than under the flexible exchange rate regime. The monetary policy taking into account external finance premium is better than the interest rate rule without considering the financial market status.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.1-26
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• 2010

This paper empirically examines whether Korean monetary policy is independent of U.S. monetary policy during the post-crisis period in which capital account is liberalized and floating exchange rate regime is adopted and during the pre-crisis period in which capital mobility is restricted and tightly managed exchange rate regime is adopted. Before capital account liberalization, monetary autonomy can be achieved in view of the trillema, even under tightly managed exchange rate regime, as capital mobility is restricted. On the other hand, for the period after capital account liberalization, monetary autonomy can be also achieved in view of the trillema, as exchange rate stability is given up. Securing monetary autonomy, however, may not be easy under liberalized capital account for a small open economy like Korea. Huge capital movements can generate excessive instability in foreign exchange and asset markets. Strengthened international economic linkages may also be another factor to prevent monetary policy from being independent. Using block-exogenous structural VAR model, the effects of U.S. monetary policy shocks on Korean economy are examined. Empirical results show that Korean monetary policy is not independent of U.S. monetary policy for both periods before and after capital account liberalization. For the period after capital account liberalization, Korea does not seem to have implemented floating exchange rate policy in practice, which may lead Korean monetary policy to be dependent on U.S. monetary policy. For the period after capital account liberalization, portfolio flows respond dramatically to the U.S. monetary policy, which may also keep Korean monetary policy from being independent.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.6 no.3
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• pp.103-113
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• 2019

The effectiveness of monetary policy critically depends upon how well the transmission mechanism functions, so that the desired impact on output and inflation is achieved. The purpose of this paper is to study the transmission mechanism of monetary policy by analyzing the impact on inflation and output during multiple indicator regime (1998-99 to 2014) in an emerging economy-India. The Inflation Targeting Regime is also briefly outlined alongwith the impact on output and inflation. Using quarterly data for the period 1997 to 2017, the paper uses weighted average call money market rate as a proxy for the policy rate and evaluates the strength of the interest rate channel. We use a conventional Structural vector auto regression (SVAR) methodology to evaluate the efficacy and show the impluse response functions. Our results find that changes in the policy rate impact output growth steeply with a lag of about two quarters and the impact on inflation is maximized after three quarters. The study concludes that the monetary policy in India has a significant impact on output and inflation in the short-to-medium-run. After the policy shock, the fall in the output growth rate is of greater magnitude than the fall in inflation.

• East Asian Economic Review
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.217-239
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• 2018

This paper tests empirically the causal relationship between bank loans and the monetary base before and after the adoption of inflation targeting in seven Asia-Pacific countries using Toda-Yamamoto Granger non causality test and the bootstrap test for causality. The most striking finding is that the bank loans Granger cause the monetary base during the inflation targeting period in all the countries, except Japan, which was under the influence of the quantitative easing, whereas the causality appeared diverse before the inflation targeting regime. This result implies the need for the policy makers to take the endogenous nature of the money supply into account in the modern economy.

• International Area Studies Review
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.49-67
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• 2008

In this paper, we address the problem of optimal monetary policy rule in the presence of abrupt shifts in the structure of the economy. To do so, we first estimate a Markov switching model for the US housing price inflation, and find evidence supporting the presence of two distinct regimes for the US housing price inflation. One of the two regimes identified appears 'usual', in that housing price inflation negatively responds to higher real interest rate. The other regime is 'unusual', in that the housing price inflation is positively related with real interest rate. We then solve an optimal control problem of the FRB under the presence of the two regimes thus identified. The optimal policy is 'asymmetric' in that the optimal responses in the 'usual' regime require the FRB to lean against the wind to inflationary pressure, while the FRB is recommended to accommodate it in the unusual regime. It is also found that the optimal degree of responses is more conservative when the FRB acknowledges the uncertainty about future regime.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.141-153
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• 1991

The optimal choice of the tax rate and the inflation rate framework is extended to yield relevant interpretations for the optimal fiscal and monetary policy regime in Korea. To study the relationship between the government budget and monetary growth in different environments of policy coordination, two models assuming different degrees of fiscal dominance are developed. By modelling differing institutional arrangements of the fiscal and the monetary authority from an optimal government finance viewpoint, we find the optimal relationship among some important fiscal and monetary variables. By testing the existence of the relationship empirically, we find the characteristics of the optimal policy-mix regime in Korea. The first model-the strong from of fiscal dominance-studies the optimal collection of seigniorage in a period-by-period optimization with standard assumptions on the income velocity of money, deriving a general testable result: the optimal inflation/tax rate ratio co-vary with the marginal revenue ratio. The second model-the weak form of fiscal dominance-studies an implication of the inflationary bias of discretionary monetary policy in the presence of fiscal side distortions. This model shows that the tax rate and the inflation rate can have a positive correlation. Empirical tests of the theoretical results are done for the Korean economy for 1972-1989 period. The test results show that the macroeconomic policy regime in Korea can be characterized by the strong form of fiscal dominance, implying the importance of the government budget in explaining money growth and inflation.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.33 no.1
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• pp.1-44
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• 2011

Terms of trade shocks have been considered one of the main driving forces causing business cycle fluctuations in small open economies. Despite their importance in business cycles of small open economies, it is hard to find a serious study in existing literature investigating their implications on monetary policy under a small open economy. Considering it, this paper studies what form of monetary policy rule is the most adequate for a small open economy where terms of trade shocks are dominant factors in generating its business cycle fluctuations. For this purpose, various implementable monetary policy rules frequently analyzed in existing literature are compared in terms of social welfare levels which they can provide for the economy respectively. Main results of this paper can be summarized as follows. First, for a small open economy where terms of trade shocks are main driving forces of its business cycle fluctuations, the nontradable goods price inflation targeting can provide higher level of social welfare than other traditional monetary policy rules such as the CPI inflation targeting or the fixed exchange rate regime. Second, the social welfare improvement of the non-tradable goods price inflation targeting is more apparent when export goods price shocks are more important than import goods price shocks.

• East Asian Economic Review
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.409-427
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• 2019

This paper sets up a new Keynesian model with external habit to explore the role of each shock over business cycles in Korea. The estimated model via maximum likelihood shows that the productivity shock plays a pivotal role in explaining the output variations before and after the financial crisis since mid-1970s. It also shows that the model with external habit is more successful in explaining the business cycles in Korea after the Asian financial crisis than the model without habit. The monetary policy shock which dominates by accounting for more than 70 percent of the unconditional variance of the inflation rate before the financial crisis is less important in the inflation rate fluctuations after the financial crisis. This partly reflects the regime change of the monetary policy to the inflation targeting rule after the financial crisis.

• International Area Studies Review
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.66-88
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• 2009

This paper studies optimal discretionary monetary policy in the presence of uncertainty in the housing sector. In particular, we allow two possible regimes regarding the evolution of housing price inflation and the effects of housing price inflation on the aggregate demand. Estimation results with the US data confirm the presence of two distinctive regimes, one 'normal' and the other more akin to the housing price 'bubble' state. The optimal policy is 'asymmetric' in that the optimal responses in the 'normal' regime require the central bank to lean against the wind to inflationary pressure from CPI and housing inflation, while the central bank is recommended to accommodate it in the other regime.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.193-218
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• 2006

This paper examines the macroeconomic structural differences of the free floating exchange rate regime and the managed float exchange rate regime focusing on the Korean economy, and compares it to the two benchmark economies, Japan and Australia. Korea's shift to the free floating exchange rate regime from the managed float exchange rate regime came after the 1997 economic crisis. Korea's exchange rate policy provides a unique opportunity to study the different behaviors or roles, if any, of managed float and free floating exchange rate regimes. Based on a simple monetary model, we find that the exchange rates of Korea are more sensitive to the economic fundamentals under the free floating regime than under the managed float regime. Impulse response analysis shows that exchange rate pass-through into domestic variables, especially inflation rate, has a bigger short-term impact under the floating regime than under the managed regime. This finding is consistent with the view that the managed (or fixed) regime provides the domestic price stability necessary for the economic growth for the developing countries.