Working Papers
2021
April 30, 2021
Macroeconomic Impact of Foreign Exchange Intervention: Some Cross-country Empirical Findings
Description: Based on VAR analyses across 26 countries, we show that, although foreign exchange intervention (FXI) is effective in stabilizing the nominal exchange rate in the short run, its impacts on the real exchange rate are less significant: Limitations on nominal exchange rate flexibility may induce adjustments to the real exchange rate through domestic prices. We find that countries that intervene more heavily in response to external shocks experience greater general and asset price volatility, which is not conducive to countering the impact of external shocks. We show that China’s macroeconomic responses to external shocks are broadly consistent with international experiences among intervening countries. The simple methodological framework adopted in this paper is meant to examine a broad set of macroeconomic variables and bears limitations; our findings serve to motivate more structural analysis on FXI’s macroeconomic impacts going forward.
April 29, 2021
Financial Cycles – Early Warning Indicators of Banking Crises?
Description: Can the upturns and downturns in financial variables serve as early warning indicators of banking crises? Using data from 59 advanced and emerging economies, we show that financial overheating can be detected in real time. Equity prices and output gap are the best leading indicators in advanced markets; in emerging markets, these are equity and property prices and credit gap. Moreover, aggregating this information flags financial crisis many years before the crisis. Lastly, we find that the length of financial cycles is of medium-term frequency, calling into question the longer frequency widely used in the estimation of countercyclical capital buffers.
April 29, 2021
Can Fintech Foster Competition in the Banking System in Latin America and the Caribbean?
Description: This paper revisits the competitive environment of the banking system in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) and investigates the early impact of fintech development in the region thus far. Against the backdrop of high net interest margins (NIMs) and limited financial depth in the region, panel regressions broadly confirm results of existing literature on the association of NIMs with the changes in the financial sector structure, including market concentration, administrative costs, and foreign banks, although differences between domestic and foreign banks narrowed after the 2008-09 Global Financial Crisis. Difference-in-difference regressions and case studies on Brazil and Mexico suggest that fintech is associated with a reduction in NIMs and defensive responses by incumbent banks that benefit consumers. The case studies also shed light on regulatory approaches and prudential considerations in fostering financial innovation and banking sector competition.
April 29, 2021
Leakages from Macroprudential Regulations: The Case of Household-Specific Tools and Corporate Credit
Description: Sector-specific macroprudential regulations increase the riskiness of credit to other sectors. Using firm-level data, this paper computed the measures of the riskiness of corporate credit allocation for 29 advanced and emerging economies. Consistently across these measures, the paper finds that during credit expansions, an unexpected tightening of household-specific macroprudential tools is followed by a rise in riskier corporate lending. Quantitatively, such unexpected tightening during a period of rapid credit growth increases the riskiness of corporate credit by around 10 percent of the historical standard deviation. This result supports early policy interventions when credit vulnerabilities are still low, since sectoral leakages will be less important at this stage. Further evidence from bank lending standards surveys suggests that the leakage effects are stronger for larger firms compared to SMEs, consistent with recent evidence on the use of personal real estate as loan collateral by small firms.
April 29, 2021
Limits to Private Climate Change Mitigation
Description: As climate change looms larger, many look to sustainable investing that incorporates environmental, social, and governance (ESG) concerns as part of the way forward. To assess scope for ESG-conscious investing to achieve climate change goals, we explore the link between emissions growth and ESG scores using firm-level data for the largest emitters around the world. Discouragingly, our analysis uncovers at best a weak relationship: firms with better ESG scores do display somewhat slower emissions growth but this link is substantially attenuated and no longer statistically significant if we limit attention to within-country or within-firm variation. Our findings suggest limited scope for sustainable investing strategies conditioned solely on ESG indicators to meaningfully help mitigate climate change and, more broadly, underscore the need to continue to build consensus towards effective economy-wide policies to address climate change.
April 29, 2021
Is There a One-Size-Fits-All Approach to Inclusive Growth? A Case Study Analysis
Description: Is there a one-size-fits-all approach to inclusive growth? We look at four key case studies across advanced and emerging markets—the Nordics, India, Brazil, and Egypt—to try to answer this question. We highlight qualitatively in these countries the key components of inclusive growth models, outcomes from these models, and the road ahead in the respective countries. Some of the analysis focuses on co-operative labor markets in the Nordics, direct benefit transfers in India, the role of social assistance and commodity boom in Brazil, and the inequality puzzle in Egypt. The paper finds that there is a lack of homogeneity among the approaches by these countries and identifies the need for customized solutions to inclusive growth. A one-size-fits-all approach doesn’t seem to work. The more customized the inclusive growth model, the better the overall outcome.
April 29, 2021
The Macroeconomic Impacts of Digitalization in Sub-Saharan Africa: Evidence from Submarine Cables
Description: The Macroeconomic Impacts of Digitalization in Sub-Saharan Africa: Evidence from Submarine Cables
April 29, 2021
Risks and Vulnerabilities in the U.S. Bond Mutual Fund Industry
Description: This paper assesses liquidity risk for the United States (U.S.) bond mutual funds industry and performs a range of analyses to identify which fund categories are more vulnerable to distress than others, and how sales from funds can impact financial stability. We develop a new measure to identify vulnerable categories based on expected outflows labelled ‘Flows in Distress’. Overall, most U.S. mutual funds are resilient yet high yield (HY) and loan funds would face a liquidity shortfall when faced with severe redemption shocks. Combined sales from funds can have a sizeable price impact. Finally, our contagion analysis using data on fund flows and returns shows that Investment Grade (IG) corporate bonds funds, municipal bond funds and government bond funds are more likely to spread distress to other fund categories than HY, EM and loan funds. When the first type of funds experiences stress, other funds categories are likely to experience stress as well.
April 29, 2021
Pakistan: Spending Needs for Reaching Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
Description: This paper assesses the additional spending required to make substantial progress towards achieving the SDGs in Pakistan. We focus on critical areas of human (education and health) and physical (electricity, roads, and water and sanitation) capital. For each sector, we document the progress to date, assess where Pakistan stands relative to its peers, highlight key challenges, and estimate the additional spending required to make substantial progress. The estimates for the additional spending are derived using the IMF SDG costing methodology. We find that to achieve the SDGs in these sectors would require additional annual spending of about 16 percent of GDP in 2030 from the public and private sectors combined.
April 29, 2021
Impacts of Interest Rate Cap on Financial Inclusion in Cambodia
Description: Interest rate caps, despite their intended objective of broadening financial inclusion, can have undesirable effects on financial inclusion under certain conditions. This paper examines the effect of microfinance-loan interest rate caps on financial inclusion in Cambodia. Based on a difference-in-difference analysis on bank and microfinance supervisory data, results show some unintended impact on financial inclusion. The cap led to a significant increase in non-interest fees charged on new loans following the introduction of an annual cap. Microfinance borrowers declined immediately, amid an increase in credit growth, as microfinance institutions targeted larger borrowers at the expense of smaller ones. Microfinance institutions, responded differently to the cap, considering their own operation and funding costs, and client base. Two years after the cap, institutions resumed lending to a wider group of borrowers with lower funding and operation costs brought by mobile payment development.