Gianni De Nicolo

Monetary Disturbances Matter for Business Fluctuations in the G-7

This paper examines the importance of monetary disturbances for cyclical fluctuations in real activity and inflation. It employs a novel identification approach which uses the sign of the cross correlation function in response to shocks to assign a structural interpretation to orthogonal innovations. We find that monetary shocks significantly drive output and inflation cycles in all G-7 countries; that they are the dominant source of fluctuations in three of the seven countries; that they contain an important policy component, and that their impact is time varying.

Dollarization of the Banking System: Good or Bad?

This paper assesses the benefits and risks associated with dollarization of the banking system. We provide novel empirical evidence on the determinants of dollarization, its role in promoting financial development, and on whether dollarization is associated with financial instability. We find that: (a) the credibility of macroeconomic policy and the quality of institutions are both key determinants of cross-country variations in dollarization; (b) dollarization is likely to promote financial deepening only in a high inflation environment; and (c) financial instability is likely higher in dollarized economies. The implications of these findings for financial sector and monetary policies are discussed.

Banking Crises and Crisis Dating: Theory and Evidence

We formulate a simple theoretical model of a banking industry that we use to identify and construct theory-based measures of systemic bank shocks (SBS). These measures differ from “banking crisis” (BC) indicators employed in many empirical studies, which are constructed using primarily information on government actions undertaken in response to bank distress. Using both country-level and firm-level samples, we show that SBS indicators consistently predict BC indicators, indicating that BC indicators actually measure lagged policy responses to systemic bank shocks. We then re-examine the impact of macroeconomic factors, bank market structure, deposit insurance, and external shocks on the probability of systemic bank shocks (SBS) and on “banking crisis” (BC) indicators. We find that the impact of these variables on the likelihood of a policy response to banking distress (as represented by BC indicators) is frequently quite different from that on the likelihood of a systemic bank shock (SBS). We argue that disentangling the effects of systemic bank shocks and policy responses is crucial in understanding the roots of banking crises. We believe that many findings of a large empirical literature need to be re-assessed.

On the Sources of Business Cycles in the G-7

This paper examines sources of cyclical movements in output, inflation and the term structure of interest rates. It employs a novel identification approach which uses the sign of the cross correlation function in response to shocks to catalog orthogonal disturbances. We find that demand shocks are the dominant source output, inflation and term structure fluctuations in six of the G-7 countries. Within the class of demand disturbances, nominal shocks are dominant, but their importance declined after 1982. Furthermore, there are no significant differences in the proportion of term structure variability explained by different structural sources at different horizons.

Externalities and Macroprudential Policy

This note overviews macroprudential policy options that have been proposed to address the systemic risks experienced during the recent financial crisis. It contributes to the policy debate by providing a taxonomy of macroprudential policies in terms of the specific negative externalities in the financial system that these policies are meant to address, and discusses their interrelations and some key implementation issues.

STOCK RETURNS, TERM STRUCTURE, INFLATION, AND REAL ACTIVITY: AN INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVE

This paper analyses the empirical interdependence of asset returns, real activity and inflation from a multicountry and international point of view. We find that nominal stock returns are significantly related to inflation only in the United States, that the US term structure of interest rates predicts both domestic and foreign inflation rates while foreign term structures do not have this predictive power and that innovations in inflation and exchange rates induce insignificant responses of real and financial variables. An interpretation of the dynamics and some policy implications of the results are provided.

Systemic Risks and the Macroeconomy

This paper presents a modeling framework that delivers joint forecasts of indicators of systemic real risk and systemic financial risk, as well as stress-tests of these indicators as impulse responses to structural shocks identified by standard macroeconomic and banking theory. This framework is implemented using large sets of quarterly time series of indicators of financial and real activity for the G-7 economies for the 1980Q1-2009Q3 period. We obtain two main results. First, there is evidence of out-of sample forecasting power for tail risk realizations of real activity for several countries, suggesting the usefulness of the model as a risk monitoring tool. Second, in all countries aggregate demand shocks are the main drivers of the real cycle, and bank credit demand shocks are the main drivers of the bank lending cycle. These results challenge the common wisdom that constraints in the aggregate supply of credit have been a key driver of the sharp downturn in real activity experienced by the G-7 economies in 2008Q4- 2009Q1.

Capital Regulation, Liquidity Requirements and Taxation in a Dynamic Model of Banking

This paper studies the impact of bank regulation and taxation in a dynamic model where banks are exposed to credit and liquidity risk and can resolve financial distress in three costly forms: bond issuance, equity issuance or fire sales. We find an inverted U-shaped relationship between capital requirements and bank lending, efficiency, and welfare, with their benefits turning into costs beyond a certain threshold. By contrast, liquidity requirements reduce lending, efficiency and welfare significantly. On taxation, corporate income taxes generate higher government revenues and entail lower efficiency and welfare costs than taxes on non-deposit liabilities.

Financial stability in dollarized economies

This paper addresses the challenges to prudential supervision in highly dollarized economies, where central banks and supervisors may be constrained in the use of standard money and financial policy tools. The study’s conclusions are the basis of an ongoing policy dialogue with IMF member countries, standard-setters in the financial area, and academia. The paper is part of the policy development work conducted by the IMF’s Monetary and Financial Systems Department.

Economic Integration and Financial Stability: A European Perspective

This paper assesses changes in synchronization of real activity and financial market integration in Western Europe and evaluates their implications for financial stability. We find increased synchronization of real activity since the early 1980s and increased equity markets integration since the early 1990s. We also find that measures of systemic risk at large European financial institutions have not declined during the period 1990-2004 and that bank systemic risk profiles have converged. At the same time, the sensitivity of bank and insurance systemic risk measures to common real and financial shocks has increased in most countries. Overall, these results suggest that the integration process does not necessarily entail an unambiguously positive effect on financial stability.