Syed Abul Basher

Oil Prices, Exchange Rates and Emerging Stock Markets

While two different streams of literature exist investigating 1) the relationship between oil prices and emerging market stock prices and 2) the relationship between oil prices and exchange rates, relatively little is known about the dynamic relationship between oil prices, exchange rates and emerging market stock prices. This paper proposes and estimates a structural vector autoregression model to investigate the dynamic relationship between these variables. Impulse responses are calculated in two ways (standard and projection based methods). The model supports stylized facts. In particular, positive shocks to oil prices tend to depress emerging market stock prices and US dollar exchange rates in the short run. The model also captures stylized facts regarding movements in oil prices. A positive oil production shock lowers oil prices while a positive shock to real economic activity increases oil prices. There is also evidence that increases in emerging market stock prices increases oil prices.

PPP tests in cointegrated panels: evidence from Asian developing countries

This study tests the relative version of purchasing power parity (PPP) for a set of ten Asian developing countries using a panel cointegration framework. A ‘between-dimension’ dynamic OLS estimator as proposed by Pedroni is employed. The test results overwhelmingly reject the PPP hypothesis.

Is there really a unit root in the inflation rate? More evidence from panel data models

Time series unit root evidence suggests that inflation is nonstationary. By contrast, when using more powerful panel unit root tests, Culver and Papell (1997) find that inflation is stationary. In this article, we test the robustness of this result by applying a battery of recent panel unit root tests. The results suggest that the stationarity of inflation holds even after controlling for cross-sectional dependence and structural change.

Linear or Nonlinear Cointegration in the Purchasing Power Parity Relationship

We test long-run Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) within a general model of cointegration of linear and nonlinear form. Nonlinear cointegration is tested with rank tests of Breitung (2001). We determine first the order of integration of each variable, using monthly data from the post-Bretton Woods era for G-10 countries. In many cases prices are I(2), whereas all exchange rates are I(1). However, there are several countries that have a price level that linearly cointegrates with the US price level so that this combination is I(1). Overall, we find some, though limited, evidence for nonlinear and also linear cointegration for the weak version of PPP.

Time-varying volatility and equity returns in Bangladesh stock market

This article empirically examines the time-varying risk return relationship and the impact of institutional factors such as circuit breaker on volatility for the emerging equity market of Bangladesh [namely The Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE)] using daily and weekly stock returns. The DSE equity returns show negative skewness, excess kurtosis and deviation from normality. The returns display significant serial correlation suggesting stock market inefficiency. The results also show a significant relationship between conditional volatility and stock returns, but the risk-return parameter is found to be sensitive to choice of samples and frequencies of data. Overall, the coefficient of the risk-return parameter is negative and statistically significant. While this result is not consistent with the portfolio theory, it is possible theoretically in emerging markets as investors may not demand higher risk premia if they are better able to bear risk at times of particular volatility (Glosten et al., 1993). While lock-in did not have any overall impact on stock volatility, the imposition of a circuit breaker has contributed significantly to the volatility of realized returns. As a policy to improve the operation of capital market timely disclosure and dissemination of information to the shareholders and investors on the performance of listed companies should be emphasized.

Dependence patterns across Gulf Arab stock markets: A copula approach

Abstract Underpinned by rising hydrocarbon revenues, the stock markets of the six GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) countries have demonstrated significant integration over the past decade. This paper studies the dependence patterns of the bivariate distribution of returns across seven GCC stock markets over the period 2004–2013 using copula models. The results of the marginal models indicate strong volatility persistence in all the seven equity markets. The results from the copula models indicate that the conditional dependence across all 21 pairs of equity markets’ returns is not strictly symmetric in that the lower tail dependence is significantly greater than the upper tail dependence. The stock markets of Abu Dhabi and Dubai appear as the primary source of asymmetric dependence across the different equity market pairs.

Country Heterogeneity and Long‐Run Determinants of Inflation in the Gulf Arab States

Applying nonstationary panel data econometric methods, this paper analyzes the major sources and transmission of inflation in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries over the 1980-2008 period. We argue that, in GCC countries, money is essentially demand determined, so that the high collinearity between money and aggregate demand indicators such as non-hydrocarbon output is expected and should be dealt with accordingly. Several important results emerge from the analysis. First, the money supply stands out as a significant determinant of inflation both in short- and long-run. Both foreign prices and the nominal effective exchange rate are shown to be more successful in explaining inflation in the long-run than the short-run. The half-life of the speed of adjustment reveals that it takes about 2.9 years for 50% of a shock to the long-run equilibrium to dissipate. An implication of our results is the case it makes for more sovereign monetary policies in GCC countries.

Price Level Convergence, Purchasing Power Parity and Multiple Structural Breaks in Panel Data Analysis: An Application to U.S. Cities

This article provides a methodological and empirical approach for assessing price level convergence and its relation to purchasing power parity (PPP) using annual price data for seventeen U.S. cities during the period 1918 to 2005. We suggest a new panel data procedure that can handle a wide range of PPP concepts in the presence of multiple structural breaks using all possible pairs of real exchange rates. Testing for PPP requires the definition of parametric restrictions (parity restrictions) across regimes. In general, we find more evidence for stationarity when the parity restriction is not imposed, while imposing parity restriction leads toward the rejection of the panel stationarity. Our results can be embedded in the view of the Balassa-Samuelson approach, but where the slope of the time trend is allowed to change in the long-run.

Risk sharing in the Middle East and North Africa

This study investigates welfare gains and channels of risk sharing among 14 Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) countries, including the oil‐rich Gulf region and the resource‐scarce economies such as Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia. The results show that for the 1992–2009 period, the overall welfare gains across MENA countries were higher than those documented for the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) nations. In the Gulf region, the amount of factor income smoothing does not differ considerably when output shocks are longer lasting rather than transitory, whereas the amount smoothed by savings increases remarkably when shocks are longer lasting. In contrast, both factor income flows and international transfers respond more to permanent shocks than to transitory shocks in the non‐oil MENA countries. The results also show that a significant portion of shocks is smoothed via remittance transfers in the economically less‐developed MENA countries, but not in the oil‐rich Gulf and OECD countries. Finally, for the overall MENA region, a large part of the shock remains unsmoothed, suggesting that more market integration is needed to remedy the weak link of incomplete risk sharing.

International income risk-sharing and the global financial crisis of 2008–2009☆

We examine the impact of the global financial crisis on the degree of international income and consumption risk-sharing among industrial economies using returns on cross-border portfolio holdings (e.g., debt, equity, FDI). We split the returns from the net foreign holdings as receipts (inflows) and payments (outflows) to investigate which of the two sides exhibited the greater resilience for income risk-sharing during the recent crisis. First, we find that debt delivered better risk-sharing than equity, mainly reflecting the deficit deterioration in EMU countries during the post-crisis period. FDI, by contrast, did not correspond to noticeable risk diversification. Second, separating output shocks into positive and negative components reveals that debt holding receipts (equity liability payments) performed better under negative (positive) realizations of the shock variable. Third, the unwinding of capital flows resulted in a sharp fall in income dis-smoothing via the debt liability channel in the new EU countries.