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Working Paper
International risk-sharing and the transmission of productivity shocks
A central puzzle in international finance is that real exchange rates are volatile and, in stark contradiction to efficient risk-sharing, negatively correlated with cross-country consumption ratios. This paper shows that a standard international business cycle model with incomplete asset markets augmented with distribution services can account quantitatively for these properties of real exchange rates. Distribution services, intensive in local inputs, drive a wedge between producer and consumer prices, thus lowering the impact of terms-of-trade changes on optimal agents' decisions. This ...
Working Paper
The Short Lags of Monetary Policy
We examine the transmission of monetary policy shocks to the macroeconomy at high frequency. To do so, we construct daily consumption and investment aggregates from bank transaction records and leverage administrative data on daily corporate sales and employment for Spain. We show that variables typically viewed as slow-moving, such as consumption and corporate sales, respond significantly within weeks. By contrast, aggregate employment and (monthly) consumer prices adjust only gradually. Disaggregating responses by sector, consumption category and supply-chain distance from final demand, we ...
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International dimensions of optimal monetary policy
This paper provides a baseline general-equilibrium model of optimal monetary policy among interdependent economies with monopolistic firms that set prices one period in advance. Strict adherence to inward-looking policy objectives such as the stabilization of domestic output cannot be optimal when firms' markups are exposed to currency fluctuations. Such policies induce excessive volatility in exchange rates and foreign sales revenue, leading exporters to set higher prices in response to higher profit risk. In general, optimal rules trade off a larger domestic output gap against lower import ...
Working Paper
Exchange Rate Misalignment and External Imbalances: What is the Optimal Monetary Policy Response?
How should monetary policy respond to capital inflows that appreciate the currency, widen the current account deficit and cause domestic overheating? Using the workhorse open-macro monetary model, we derive a quadratic approximation of the utility-based global loss function in incomplete market economies, solve for the optimal targeting rules under cooperation and characterize the constrained-optimal allocation. The answer is sharp: the optimal monetary stance is contractionary if the exchange rate pass-through (ERPT) on import prices is incomplete, expansionary if ERPT is complete–implying ...
Working Paper
Soverign risk and the effects of fiscal retrenchment in deep recessions
The authors analyze the effects of government spending cuts on economic activity in an environment of severe fiscal strain, as reflected by a sizeable risk premium on government debt. Specifically, they consider a "sovereign risk channel," through which sovereign default risk spills over to the rest of the economy, raising funding costs in the private sector. The authors' analysis is based on a variant of the model suggested by Crdia and Woodford (2009). It allows for costly financial intermediation and inter-household borrowing and lending in equilibrium, but maintains the tractability of ...
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Competitive devaluations: a welfare-based approach
This paper studies the mechanism of international transmission of exchange rate shocks within a three-country Center-Periphery model, providing a choice-theoretic framework for the policy analysis and empirical assessment of competitive devaluations. If relative prices and terms of trade exhibit some flexibility conforming to the law of one price, a devaluation by one country is beggar-thy-neighbor relative to another country through its effects on cost-competitiveness in a third market. Yet, due to direct bilateral trade between the two countries, there is a large range of parameter values ...
Working Paper
Social Distancing and Supply Disruptions in a Pandemic
Drastic public health measures such as social distancing or lockdowns can reduce the loss of human life by keeping the number of infected individuals from exceeding the capacity of the health care system but are often criticized because of the social and the economic cost they entail. We question this view by combining an epidemiological model, calibrated to capture the spread of the COVID-19 virus, with a multisector model, designed to capture key characteristics of the U.S. Input Output Tables. Our two-sector model features a core sector that produces intermediate inputs not easily replaced ...
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The simple geometry of transmission and stabilization in closed and open economies
This paper provides an introduction to the recent literature on macroeconomic stabilization in closed and open economies. We present a stylized theoretical framework, illustrating its main properties with the help of an intuitive graphical apparatus. Among the issues we discuss are optimal monetary policy and the welfare gains from macroeconomic stabilization, the international transmission of real and monetary shocks and the role of exchange rate pass-through, and the design of optimal exchange rate regimes and monetary coordination among interdependent economies.
Working Paper
International risk-sharing and the transmission of productivity shocks
A central puzzle in international finance is that real exchange rates are volatile and, in stark contradiction to efficient risk-sharing, negatively correlated with relative consumptions across countries. This paper shows that a model with incomplete markets and a low price elasticity of imports can account for these properties of real exchange rates. The low price elasticity stems from introducing distribution services, which drive a wedge between producer and consumer prices and lowers the impact of terms-of-trade changes on optimal agents' decisions. In the authors' model, two very ...
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Self-validating optimum currency areas
A currency area can be a self-validating optimal policy regime, even when monetary unification does not foster real economic integration and intra-industry trade. In our model, firms choose the optimal degree of exchange rate pass-through to export prices while accounting for expected monetary policies, and monetary authorities choose optimal policy rules while taking firms' pass-through as given. We show that there exist two equilibria, each of which defines a self-validating currency regime. In the first, firms preset prices in domestic currency and let prices in foreign currency be ...