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Thesis advisor: Ryan Chahrour / The dissertation studies the sources of business cycles taking both an open and a closed economy perspective. A common feature of the two chapters composing the dissertation is the use of simple, but powerful classifications and identifications of sources of business cycles. In particular, the first chapter, titled “What are the Sources of Boom-Bust Cycles?”, concerns the distinction between economic fluctuations due to changes in beliefs, and fluctuations due to changes in fundamentals, showing results that challenge traditional approaches to modeling business cycles. The second chapter, titled “Shocks and Exchange Rates in Small Open Economies”, takes the perspective of small open economies, and concerns the distinc- tion between global and domestic shocks, showing results that are informative for a series of puzzling facts concerning the dynamics of the exchange rate. In “What are the Sources of Boom-Bust Cycles?,” joint with Marco Brianti, we provide a synthesis of two major views on economic fluctuations. One view maintains that expansions and recessions arise from the interchange of positive and negative persistent exogenous shocks to fundamentals. This is the conventional view that gave rise to the profusion of shocks used in modern dynamic stochastic general equilibrium models. In contrast, a second view, which we call the endogenous cycles view, holds that business cycle fluctuations are due to forces that are internal to the economy and that endogenously favor recurrent periods of boom followed by a bust. In this environment, cycles can occur after small perturba- tions of the long run equilibrium. We find empirical evidence pointing at the coexistence of both views. In particular, we find that the cyclical behaviour of economic aggregates is due in part to strong internal mechanisms that generate boom-bust phenomena in response to small changes in expectations, and in part to the interchange of positive and negative persistent fundamental shocks. Motivated by our findings, we build a theory that unifies the dominant paradigm with the endogenous cycles approach. Our theory suggests that recessions and expansions are intimately related phenomena, and that understanding the nature of an expansion, whether it is driven by fundamentals or by beliefs, is a first order issue for policy makers whose mandate is to limit the occurrance of inefficient economic fluctuations. In “Shocks and Exchange Rates in Small Open Economies,” joint with Pierre De Leo, we propose a novel approach to separately identify domestic and external shocks in small open economies. Our results provide guidance about the transmission mechanism of these shocks and revisit recent conclusions drawn on the exchange rate effects of monetary policy in small open economies. The identification method is based on the premise that shocks originating from within a small economy should not influence world variables at any horizon, while external (or global) shocks should affect world variables at least at some horizon. We obtain three empirically related findings. First, external shocks feature large deviations from uncovered interest parity, while domestic shocks do not. Second, external shocks strongly comove with global risk aversion and U.S. macroeconomic variables. Third, recent puzzling estimates of the exchange rate effects of monetary policy stem from an identification of domestic shocks that fails to properly account for international spillovers. We show that a two-country small open economy model with international asset market imperfections is consistent with these facts. In our proposed model, global risk aversion shocks drive exchange rate dynamics, and a country’s net foreign asset position governs their international transmission. We provide empirical evidence that a country’s exposure to external shocks indeed depends on its net foreign asset position. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2020. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Economics.

Thesis advisor: Ryan A. Chahrour / The dissertation studies the primary sources of business-cycle fluctuations and their interaction with uncertainty and financial frictions. In my work, I examine the degree to which changes in uncertainty and financial conditions can be independent drivers of economic fluctuations; I study the sources of boom-bust cycles and whether they are linkedto credit market sentiments; and I ask how financial frictions affect economic fluctuations in terms of prices and quantities. In "Financial and Uncertainty Shocks", I separately identify financial and uncertainty shocks using a novel SVAR procedure and discuss their distinct monetary policy implications. The procedure relies on the qualitatively different responses of corporate cash holdings: after a financial shock, firms draw down their cash reserves as they lose access to external finance, while uncertainty shocks drive up cash holdings for precautionary reasons. Although both financial and uncertainty shocks are contractionary, my results show that the former are inflationary while the latter generate deflation. I rationalize this pattern in a New-Keynesian model: after a financial shock, firms increase prices to raise current liquidity; after an uncertainty shock, firms cut prices in response to falling demand. These distinct channels have stark monetary policy implications: conditional on uncertainty shocks the divine coincidence applies, while in case of financial shocks the central bank can stabilize inflation only at the cost of more unstable output fluctuations. In "What are the Sources of Boom-Bust Cycles?", joint with Vito Cormun, we provide a synthesis of two major views on economic fluctuations. One view maintains that expansions and recessions arise from the interchange of positive and negative persistent exogenous shocks to fundamentals. This is the conventional view that gave rise to the profusion of shocks used in modern dynamic stochastic general equilibrium models. In contrast, a second view, which we call the endogenous cycles view, holds that business cycle fluctuations are due to forces that are internal to the economy and that endogenously favor recurrent periods of boom followed by a bust. In this environment, cycles can occur after small perturbations of the long run equilibrium. We find empirical evidence pointing at the coexistence of both views. In particular, we find that the cyclical behaviour of economic aggregates is due in part to strong internal mechanisms that generate boom-bust phenomena in response to small changes in expectations, and in part to the interchange of positive and negative persistent fundamental shocks. Motivated by our findings, we build a theory that unifies the dominant paradigm with the endogenous cycles approach. Our theory suggests that recessions and expansions are intimately related phenomena, and that understanding the nature of an expansion, whether it is driven by fundamentals or by beliefs, is a first order issue for policy makers whose mandate is to limit the occurrance of inefficient economic fluctuations. In "COVID-19 and Credit Constraints'', joint with Pierluigi Balduzzi, Emanuele Brancati, and Fabio Schiantarelli, we investigate the economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and the role played by credit constraints in the transmission mechanism, using a novel survey of expectations and plans of Italian firms, taken just before and after the outbreak. Most firms revise downward their expectations for sales, orders, employment, and investment, while prices are expected to increase at a faster rate, with geographical and sectoral heterogeneity in the size of the effects. Credit constraints amplify the effects on factor demand and sales of the COVID-19 generated shocks. Credit-constrained firms also expect to charge higher prices, relative to unconstrained firms. The search for and availability of liquidity is a key determinant of firms' plans. Finally, both supply and demand shocks play a role in shaping firms' expectations and plans, with supply shocks being slightly more important in the aggregate. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2021. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Economics.

A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in Ful llment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Economics 15 July, 2015 / The thesis focuses on the sources of macroeconomic uctuations in ten (10) selected African economies over the period 1990-2011. Data for the study were obtained from the International Financial statistics (IFS), the World Bank, and Central Bank database of the selected countries. We formulate a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) model for the thesis. We estimate the model using quarterly time series data. Due to data availability, the sample size di¤ers from one country to the other. First, we investigate the relative contributions of internal and external shocks to economic uc- tuations in African economies. Second, we evaluate the signi cance of the balance sheet channel in African economies. Third, we investigate the ef- fectiveness of sovereign wealth funds in reducing macroeconomic volatility caused by commodity price shocks. The thesis has 5 chapters. Chapter 1 is the general introduction. Chapters 2, 3, and 4 are stand-alone related papers on macroeconomic uctuations. Chapter 5 is the conclusion. Chapter 1 introduces the study. We discuss the research problem, the moti- vation, the objectives, and the research questions. We also explain both our theoretical and empirical contributions to the literature. Moreover, we high- light the signi cance and the key ndings of the study. Finally, we conclude the chapter with a brief outline on the organisation of the study. Chapter 2 investigates the relative contributions of internal and external shocks to macroeconomic uctuations in African economies. We formulate and estimate a monetary DSGE model to examine the sources of economic uctuations in ten African countries. The model is estimated with the Bayesian technique using twelve macroeconomic variables. Generally, the ndings indicate that both the internal and external shocks signi cantly in- uence output uctuations in African countries. Over a four quarter horizon, internal shocks are dominant while over eight to sixteen quarter horizons, the external shocks are dominant. Among the external shocks, external debt, ex- change rate, foreign interest rate and commodity price shocks account for a large part of output variations in African economies. Money supply and productivity shocks are the most important internal shocks contributing to output uctuations in African countries. To ensure macroeconomic stability, African countries need to formulate appropriate exchange rate and exter- nal debt management policies, diversify the economies, and create sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) or use hedging instruments. Chapter 3 evaluates the quantitative signi cance of the balance sheet chan- nel in African economies. We construct an open economy monetary DSGE model where entrepreneurs nance investment by issuing foreign currency- denominated debt. The model is estimated with Bayesian technique. The evidence suggests that the balance sheet e¤ects are empirically important in African economies. The marginal likelihood results clearly favour the model with nancial frictions. Moreover, the ndings indicate that the balance sheet e¤ect reduces the e¤ectiveness of monetary policy, raises the sensitiv- ity of the risk premium to external debt, and contracts output. This indi- cates that exchange rate depreciation is contractionary in African economies. We conclude that African countries should reduce their exposure to foreign currency-denominated debt and also deepen their domestic bond markets. Chapter 4 investigates the e¤ectiveness of sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) in reducing macroeconomic volatility in commodity exporting African countries. We formulate and simulate a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) model that features SWFs. The simulation results suggest that the creation of SWFs can reduce macroeconomic volatility in commodity exporting coun- tries. Particularly, SWFs can reduce government expenditure, real exchange rate, and external debt volatility. Since these are the channels through which commodity price shocks are transmitted to the African economies, we rec- ommend that African countries should create SWFs to sterilize the in ow of commodity revenue and to prevent the resource curse problem. Chapter 5 concludes the study. We summarize the key ndings in Chapters 2, 3, and 4. We highlight the policy implications of our ndings. Finally, we suggest areas for further research.

Many economists and politicians have blamed fixed exchange rate regimes for several crises taking place in developing countries after the 1980s. According to them, since the beginning of the 2000s, widespread implementation of flexible exchange rate regimes and high international reserves have prevented developing countries from experiencing similar catastrophic experiences. This interpretation seems to be misleading. We believe that even flexible exchange rate regimes with high international reserves do not have a magic to prevent a financial crisis. Although flexible exchange rate regimes and high international reserves might have played some positive roles in the relatively calm period of 2001-2008 / the main reason behind the calmness of this period is the fact that developing countries did not face a strong financial shock during this period. In the presence of &ldquo / safe havens&rdquo / , which implies existence of safe developed countries for financial capital to move into, flexible exchange rate regimes and the accumulated large reserves may not be adequate when a wave of financial shocks, as in the form of sudden stops and capital reversals, hit developing countries. Indeed, the absence of safe heavens and very low yields in developed countries eased the pressure on developing countries during the recent financial crisis of 2008-2009. If developed economies get their safe haven status back, developing countries might face new financial shocks. In this sense developing countries would experience new financial crises in this new period. We will elaborate on the possible conditions of these prospective financial crises in this thesis.

This thesis aims to understand the role of interest rate setting behavior of the banks for the transmission of technology, monetary policy and loan rate shocks into the real economy. To this end, we introduce a monopolistically competitive banking sector into a New Keynesian model. Here, each bank can change its loan rate only infrequently in the fashion of Calvo type staggered contract. This setting implies that the adjustment of the aggregate loan rate is sticky, which is consistent with the empirical evidence. The results show that having sticky adjustment in the loan market changes the dynamics of the model significantly. Following each shock, the sluggish adjustment of the loan rate affects the amount of loan used by the borrowers considerably. This is the main reason behind the differentials across the impulse responses of the model with sticky loan rate and flexible loan rate.

Modern portfolio theory stipulates that an investor can reduce systemic risk simply by diversifying its assets across national boundaries. Therefore, the issue of whether stock markets are cointegrated carries important implications for portfolio diversification. This study aims to identify and model a relationship between four equity markets namely, Turkish, European, North American and emerging markets using cointegration technique. We investigated the existence of cointegrating equation between four stock market indices and also the existence of a structural break. During our investigation, we constructed a vector error correction model (VECM) to observe short and long run relationships between the four markets. We used daily data from the October 23, 1995 until November 20, 2009 and relevant Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) indices, namely MSCI Turkey, MSCI North America, MSCI Europe and MSCI Emerging Markets. Our first finding was that the Turkish equity markets are cointegrated with European, North American and emerging markets indicates that investing in the Turkish equity market does not provide an opportunity for risk diversification for international investors in the long run. It is only possible to benefit from the discrepancies which may occur in the short run. Furthermore, we identified a structural break contemporaneous with crisis of November 2000.

This study analyzes the effect of capital outflows on economic growth though the channels described in sudden stop literature. Using the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) bounds testing approach / it is found that there is a cointegration between capital inflows, real exchange rate and real GDP. The results show that there is a significant positive long-run relation between capital inflows and growth. It is also found that capital inflows affect real output in the short run. The results show that real exchange rate is not a significant determinant of real output both in the short run and long run. Moreover, in order to capture the dynamic responses, a vector autoregressive (VAR) methodology has been employed. The results show that a negative innovation in capital inflows causes real exchange rate depreciation and output contraction.

This thesis measures the effects of transformation of Turkish banks from a &ldquo / traditional&rdquo / one to a &ldquo / modern&rdquo / one over the period 2002-2009 and 2008 global financial crisis on efficiency of Turkish banks. Malmquist Total Factor Productivity Index is constructed using data envelopment analysis to measure the efficiency change in Turkish banking sector. The paper also analyzes the sensitivity of efficiency measures to different descriptions of inputs and outputs by employing two different approaches to describe the inputs and outputs of a bank. The major difference between the approaches is the use of deposits and non-deposit funds as input or output. Both confirm that the efficiency of the Turkish banking sector had increased over the period under examination and 2008 global financial crisis had adversely affected the efficiency of Turkish banks. The results show that the banks which had advanced in transformation to modern banking before 2001 financial crisis had experienced higher than the average increments in efficiency in the post-2001 financial crisis period.

This study investigates the degree of exchange rate pass-through to prices in different sectors for Turkish economy using Johansen Cointegration procedure. The study is based on quarterly data from 1994:1 to 2003:4. In this study it is concluded that the long-run exchange rate pass-through to overall wholesale prices for Turkey is very high and nearly complete. High pass-through degrees are also valid for different sub-sectors wholesale prices like private, public, manufacturing industry and energy. Moreover, it is detected that the prices set by public sector have higher exchange rate pass-through but longer adjustment period as compared to private sector prices.