Optimum Currency Areas Structural Changes And The Endogeneity Of The Oca Criteria

The present paper has two aims. The first aim is to test whether six new member states of the European Union (the six Central and Eastern European Countries) form an optimum currency area (OCA) with the eurozone, in an attempt to assess their readiness for euro adoption. The second aim is to examine whether the introduction of the euro in 1999 and the decision of the countries to seek to join the euro area created any forces fostering their convergence, evidence which would be in line with the theory on the endogeneity of the OCA criteria. Our findings indicate that the introduction of the euro did promote integration of the six new member states and that, at present, they are quite well aligned with the eurozone.

This paper tests an endogeneity hypothesis of optimum currency area (OCA) criteria (Frankel and Rose, 1998) on a cross-section of OECD countries between 1990 and 1999. The findings indicate that convergence of business cycles relates to intra-industry trade, but has no direct relation between business cycles and bilateral trade intensity. As far as intra-industry trade is positively correlated with trade intensities, this result confirms the OCA endogeneity hypothesis. The endogeneity of OCA linkage criteria implies extensive business cycle harmonization between CEECs and EU countries in the medium term. Published in: Contemporary Economic Policy vol. 22, no 1 (2004) pp. 1-12, ISSN 1074-3529.

A country's suitability for entry into a currency union depends on a number of economic conditions. These include, inter alia, the intensity of trade with other potential members of the currency union, and the extent to which domestic business cycles are correlated with those of the other countries. But international trade patterns and international business cycle correlations are endogenous. This paper develops and investigates the relationship between the two phenomena. Using thirty years of data for twenty industrialized countries, we uncover a strong and striking empirical finding: countries with closer trade links tend to have more tightly correlated business cycles. It follows that countries are more likely to satisfy the criteria for entry into a currency union after taking steps toward economic integration than before.

He optimum currency areas (OCA) theory deals with the criteria as well as the costs and benefits of for countries to enter/form a common currency area. The traditional OCA theory explores the economic variables determining the boarders for OCA, and whether a single country fulfills the requirements to join an OCA by employing the static costs and benefits analysis. The endogenous OCA theory introduces the long-run dynamic equilibrium analysis into the cost-benefit balance model and suggests that economic and monetary integration are self reinforcing processes, i.e., the endogenous nature of OCA criteria may make a country be more likely to satisfy the criteria for the entry into a currency union ex post though it fails ex ante, which in turn reduces the costs of a currency union by increasing the symmetry of disturbances. Although the creation of the euro is often cited as the most modern and largest-scale case study of OCA, the evolvement of economic integration in other regions, especially East Asia, has increased interest in the viability of a common currency for economies in these regions. The previous studies in Euro Union could provide us new perspective and useful instruments of analysis with respect to the study on other regions. This paper surveys the evolution of the theoretical and empirical studies on endogeneities of OCA criteria in order to draw inferences for the prospects and challenges of greater monetary cooperation in other regions.

Surveys the recent literature on optimal currency areas (OCAs). Topics that are covered include theoretical developments in the context of general-equilibrium models and empirical work on shocks asymmetry and adjustment mechanisms.

A model of optimum currency areas is presented using a general equilibrium model with regionally differentiated goods. The choice of a currency union depends upon the size of the underlying disturbances, the correlation between these disturbances, the costs of transactions across currencies, factor mobility across regions, and the interrelationships between demand for different goods. It is found that, while a currency union can raise the welfare of the regions within the union, it unambiguously lowers welfare for those outside the union.

This paper investigates the circumstances under which it is beneficial to participate in a currency area. A two-country monetary model of trade with nominal rigidities encompasses the real and monetary arguments suggested by the optimum currency area literature: correlation of real shocks, international factor mobility, fiscal adjustment, openness, difference in national inflationary biases, correlation of monetary shocks, and benefits of a single currency. The effect of openness on the net benefits is ambiguous, contrary to the usual argument that more open economies are better candidates for a currency area. Countries do not necessarily agree on whether a given currency union should be created.

This essay considers some prescriptions that are currently popular regarding exchange rate regimes: a general movement toward floating, a general movement toward fixing, or a general movement toward either extreme and away from the middle. The whole spectrum from fixed to floating is covered (including basket pegs, crawling pegs, and bands), with special attention to currency boards and dollarization. One overall theme is that the appropriate exchange rate regime varies depending on the specific circumstances of the country in question (which includes the classic optimum currency area criteria, as well as some newer criteria related to credibility) and depending on the circumstances of the time period in question (which includes the problem of successful exit strategies). Latin American interest rates are seen to be more sensitive to US interest rates when the country has a loose dollar peg than when it has a tight peg. It is also argued that such relevant country characteristics as income correlations and openness can vary over time, and that the optimum currency area criterion is accordingly endogenous.