This dissertation is a collection of three chapters on inflation dynamics and money demands. Chapter 1 tests the forward-looking New Keynesian Phillips curve using a novel panel data set for the 50 U.S. states from year 1977 to 2005. Consistent with Gali and Gertler (1999), our results support a linkage between inflation and real unit labor cost, and reject a linkage between inflation and output gap. We also address several important econometrics issues in the empricial studies. Our tests on model identification and instruments validity reveal that compared with the model with real unit labor cost, the GMM estimators in the model with output gap are more sensitive to the choice of instruments. Also, we find that the unit labor cost has stronger persistence than the output gap, and that these two variables have almost opposite dynamic cross correlations with inflation. We conclude that the observed high autocorrelation properties of U.S. inflation-as measured by the sum of AR coefficients-is well described by the forward-looking New Keynesian Phillips curve. In the second chapter, we extend the pure forward-looking New Keynesian Phillips curve to a hybrid model. We adopt a dynamic panel data model by adding a lagged inflation variable to the explanatory variables. We find relative larger weights of future inflation than the lagged inflation. This finding confirms the forward looking behavior in theory and it is also consistent with our results from the pure forward-looking model estimation. Furthermore, we obtain more evidence of dominant forward-looking behavior by using the principal components based instruments. Our results show that principal components based methods produce more precise estimates with a substantial decrease in all three estimated standard errors. We obtain more evidence of dominant forward-looking behavior across all regressions. By comparing two groups of the Kleibergen-Paap Wald F rk statistic (KP statistic), we find that using principal components is a good option to overcome the weak identifications. This finding is consistent with Bai and Ng (2010) and Kapetanios and Marcellino (2010). However, contrast with our earlier findings, in the hybrid model, the identification of the parameter of the real marginal cost becomes a problem. The third chapter investigates the long-run money demand using a panel data set for the 50 U.S. states from year 1977 to 2005. Regional heterogeneity as well as the cointegration and cross-section correlation properties of panel data are considered in great detail. Contrary to previous studies in the field, we adopt panel data techniques with nonstationary and cointegrated variables which controls for dynamics, non-stationarity, parameter heterogeneity and unobserved time-varying heterogeneity. The empirical results reveal an income elasticity close to 0.7 and an interest semi-elasticity around -0.02 and these two parameter values match closely with the empirical estimates by Ball (2001). Furthermore, it is found that the magnitude of the estimates of error correction term is much less than unity (around 0.05), which suggests that the adjustment time of U.S. money demand to return to its long-run equilibrium may be rather long. Compared to a standard homogeneous panel model of money demand function, our results obtained from heterogeneous panel model estimation indicate that the heterogeneity across states is important. It shows that the observed instability of money demand functions in aggregate U.S. studies could be explained by inappropriate aggregation across heterogeneous states. After accounting for regional heterogeneity, the estimates of income elasticity for the U.S. money demand function are clearly less than one.

The primary purpose of this thesis was to investigate if the modern Phillips Curve is valid for ASEAN five (Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore and Philippines) countries using a time-varying approach in the form of an ARMA-GARCH model. The method enables us to investigate how the inflation volatility reacts to economic shocks and if its history can predict the conditional variance of inflation. This study also aimed to investigate whether financial liberalisation affects the conditional variance of inflation. Moreover, we introduce a new parameter into the Phillips Curve. We propose the inclusion of a globally decomposed financial spillover index to see how it affects the inflation dynamics. Examining the period between 1996-2020, using monthly data. We find weak results, and the Phillips Curve was only valid for Singapore. Our findings also suggest that the inflation volatility is highly time-varying, indicating the suitability of the ARMA-GARCH framework. Significant coefficients in the model allow forecasting the conditional variance of inflation. The results support the idea that financial liberalisation to be volatility augmenting in some countries, suggesting a negative relationship between the degree of financial integration and received spillover effects. The globally decomposed spillover indices demonstrated weak results. For further investigations, we, therefore, propose the usage of regionally decomposed spillover indices.

The purpose of the thesis is to introduce novel measure of real marginal cost in the New Keynesian Phillips Curve (NKPC) and compares its performance with conventional mea- sures such as output gap and labour share of income. Real marginal cost is derived from a flexible function whereas labour share is based on restrictive assumption of Cobb-Douglas technology. Dynamic correlations and results of NKPC indicate that real marginal cost is better than ad hoc measure of output gap and labour share. Given the heterogeneity in price setting behaviour across sectors, cost functions and NKPC are estimated for the agriculture, manufacturing and other sectors of Pakistan's economy. Real marginal cost is derived from static and dynamic cost functions. In the presence of adjustment costs, dynamic cost functions that are consistent and integrated with their static systems are required. Such dynamic translog cost functions are estimated after testing the theoretical properties and existence of long term relationships in the static functions. Cost attributes, marginal cost, total factor productivity, technological progress, demand and substitution elasticities are derived from static and dynamic functions. Three specifications of forward looking and hybrid form of the Phillips curves are estimated with real marginal cost, output gap and labour share. Results indicate that hybrid specifications perform better than the forward looking models in terms of goodness of fit and statistical significance. Further, comparison of Phillips curves estimated with real marginal cost, output gap and labour share indicate that real marginal cost performs better in explaining inflation dynamics in Pakistan. The results indicate that forward looking behaviour dominates and high level of nominal rigidities persists in Pakistan. Finally, hybrid form of the NKPC is estimated for a panel of sixteen Asian economies. With the consideration of heterogeneity and aggregation bias, the mean group, random coefficient and weighted average coefficients are derived from individual estimates. The unobserved time variant common factors cause cross correlation in the errors that may lead towards inconsistent estimates. Therefore, cross section averages of the explanatory and the dependent variables are augmented in hybrid specification to capture the effect of latent variables. Findings suggest that the discount factor is almost 0.94, the nominal rigidities are 33% and the weights of expected and past inflation are 66% and 33% respectively. Nominal rigidities of the Asian economies are lower than the estimates for US and Euro areas. The weights of expected and past inflation of the Asian economies are consistent with the US but lower than the estimates from the Euro areas.

This dissertation is divided into four essays, each of them having its own structure and methodological framework. Although each of the essays making the chapters of the thesis is self-contained, their topics are very closely related. Consequently, the reader will be able to follow the thesis in its unity. Essay I is a selective survey of the extensive, mostly theoretic, literature dealing with monetary policy rules. We aim at contextualization of the monetary policy rules in the existing monetary economics literature. We explain the logic, the inspiration and the history of the rules for the monetary policy conduct. We distinguish between instrument rules and targeting rules as two basic categories. Finally, we resume specific issues related to policy rules for small open economies. Essay II studies the logic of short-term interest rate setting pursued by 15 EU countries before and after the launch of the EMU. We employ econometric estimation of the augmented Taylor rule (TR) for individual 15 EU countries and the Euro area. Although a vast empirical evidence is available for the major economies like the US, the UK or Germany, there is an important gap in our understanding of the factors behind the short-term interest rate dynamics in smaller economies. We find that in the period preceding the euro adoption, the TR is a poor representation of monetary policy setting in most EU countries and that many central banks considered decisions made by dominant economies rather than their domestic macroeconomic developments. The analysis of monetary policy rule of the ECB features additional problems related to the heterogeneity of the EMU. We argue that results based on Euro-area aggregated series, commonly presented in empirical studies, are subject to diverse econometric problems. We provide some evidence that the ECB is concerned also with national information and propose quasi-panel analysis as a viable framework. Essay III explores the relation between the existing monetary policy and domestic price stability in small open emerging economies, in particular the 12 EU new member states. This work has three principal objectives. First, it aims at revealing the logic of interest rate setting pursued by monetary authority of each country. The linear specification of the Taylor rule, applied already in the Essay II, is accompanied by an extensive analysis of nonlinearities in monetary policy rules and the inference on their possible sources. We find that the official monetary policy is sometimes inconsistent with the empirical evidence on the short term interest rate setting. The second objective consists in revealing the determinants of the inflation process. We have found that inflation rates are driven not only by backward persistency but also by the forward-looking component. Third, we employ analysis of the conditional inflation variance so as to give account on the viability of the existing monetary policy setting for price stability. We conclude that the policy of inflation targeting seems to be preferable to exchange rate peg because it allows decreasing not only inflation rate but also its conditional variance. Essay IV seeks to shed light on inflation dynamics of four CEEC (Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia) and test when the predominant model of inflation, the New Keynesian Philips Curve (NKPC), is consistent with the data of these countries. According to the microfounded NKPC, the current inflation is related to inflation expectations and the real marginal cost. The empirical validity of this model has recently become a subject of major controversy in the monetary economics. Although we find some favorable evidence for the NKPC, it seems to be too restrictive model for small open economies. In particular, the failure of the NKPC to explain the inflation dynamics of these countries may be related to the assumption that inflation is related to forward-looking price setting of domestic monopolist firms while our evidence suggests that prices in CEEC have an important backward-looking component and the inflation is significantly driven by external factors like the exchange rate and the foreign inflation rate.

This thesis examines dynamic relationships between inflation and monetary policy in a sample of African economies using quarterly data over the period 1980:01 to 2012:04. The literature on inflation dynamics and monetary policy focuses on developed economies, with little attention devoted to the African economies, which is potentially explained by the fact that in the past monetary policy played second fiddle because of fiscal policy dominance following episodes of high inflation and stabilization policies that occurred in the 1980's. This thesis fills an important gap in assessing African's monetary policy. The thesis predominantly uses the Vector-Autoregression (VAR) framework to examine the monetary policy frameworks of the African economies. The thesis finds that an interest rate shock on average explain a more significant proportion of the variance in the output gap and inflation than the exchange rate, in terms of analysing the decomposition of shocks to the economy. This shows a shift in the monetary policy focus away from exchange rate management to interest rate targeting as the African economies have become more market oriented. The monetary policy reveal strong asymmetric responses with respect to the macroeconomic variables when inflation exceeds its threshold value. The analysis suggests that monetary policy in the African economies is regime-dependent, propagated through the inflation thresholds, such that the authorities strongly implement policy changes when inflation goes beyond a certain threshold. The thesis reveals that by taking into account the prior belief of the monetary authorities, it helps produce better estimates of the performance of the monetary policy transmission mechanism, as it combines prior information with the sampling information which is contained in the data. The overall novelty of the thesis is that some African economies are adopting inflation targeting policies instead of exchange rate management. It is imperative that the subsequent inflation targeting frameworks will achieve monetary policy objectives for the African economies and the use of interest rate management should be continued.

L’objectif de cette thèse est d’analyser l’effet de la globalisation sur la dynamique de l’inflation et sur la politique monétaire dans un monde de globalisation. Cette thèse porte 3 chapitres :Dans le premier chapitre, nous nous intéressons à l’impact de la globalisation financière sur le comportement du ciblage d’inflation dans les pays émergents, avec une attention particulière portée au taux de change : la Banque centrale répond-elle aux mouvements du taux de change ? Nous nous sommes basés sur des données trimestrielles de six pays émergents qui pratiquent la politique de ciblage d’inflation, depuis la date de l’adoption de cette dernière, jusqu’au dernier trimestre 2009 (2009 Q4). L’étude se base sur un modèle de petite économie ouverte néo-Keynésien à la Gali et Monacelli (2005). Nous utilisons un estimateur GMM à équations multiples pour analyser la relation. Les résultats nous montrent que la réponse de la Banque Centrale au taux de change est statistiquement significatif dans le cas du Brésil, du Chili, du Mexique et de la Thaïlande. En revanche, elle ne l’est pas pour la Corée ni pour la République Tchèque. Théoriquement, le résultat ne devrait pas être significatif même avec un ciblage d’inflation flexible où la banque centrale répond aux écarts d’inflation et de production.Nous pensons que les caractéristiques particulières des pays émergents, telles que la peur du flottement “fear of floating”, le manque de développement du système financier ainsi qu’un manque de crédibilité de la banque centrale, expliquent cette préoccupation des banque centrales pour les variations de change. Dans le deuxième chapitre, nous étudions d’une façon empirique l’importance relative des canaux de transmission de la politique monétaire pour le Brésil, le Chili et la Corée. Cette partie se base sur des données mensuelles depuis l’adoption du ciblage d’inflation jusqu’à décembre 2009 (2009 M12). Nous utilisons un modèle SVAR, en incorporant les principaux canaux de transmission monétaire simultanément au lieu de les considérer séparément. Les résultats empiriques indiquent que le canal de taux de change ainsi que canal du prix des actifs ont une importance relativement plus élevée que le canal du taux d’intérêt traditionnel ou le canal du crédit pour la production industrielle. Les résultats sont très différents dans le cas de l’inflation, à l’exception de la Corée. Le classement élevé canal du taux de change et du canal du prix des actifs correspondent aux résultats de Gudmundsson (2007) : le canal du taux de change pourrait avoir pris une importance grandissante avec la développement de la globalisation financière.Dans le troisième chapitre, nous étudions empiriquement le rôle de l’ouverture - réelle et financière - sur la dynamique de l’inflation au Brésil, Chile en Corée du Sud. L’étude se base sur des données mensuelles, depuis l’adoption du ciblage d’inflation jusqu’à décembre 2009. Dans ce dernier chapitre, nous utilisons méthode de moments généralisée (GMM). Le ratio Importation sur PIB est considéré comme étant l’indicateur de l’ouverture réelle. En ce qui concerne l’ouverture financière, nous considérons alternativement l’indice de Chinn et Ito (KAOPEN) mesurant le degré de libéralisation des opérations sur le compte financier, et l’indicateur proposé per Lane et Milesi-Ferreti (2009).Nous concluons dans ce chapitre qu’il existe en général une relation positive entre l’ouverture réelle et l’inflation. En ce qui concerne l’ouverture financière, les résultats sont moins tranchés et dépendent largement de l’indicateur utilisé pour mesurer l’ouverture financière. / The aim of this thesis is to analyze the impact of globalization on the dynamics of inflation and monetary policy in a globalized world. It consists of three essays.In the first essay we investigate the impact of financial globalization on the behaviour of inflation targeting emerging market economies with respect to exchange rate – Do central banks respond to exchange rate movements or not? We use quarterly data for six emerging market inflation targeting economies from the date of their inflation targeting adoption to 2009 Q4. The chapter uses small open economy new Keynesian model à la Gali and Monacelli (2005), and employs multi-equation GMM technique to investigate the relationship. We find that the response of central bank to the exchange rate in case of Brazil, Chile, Mexico and Thailand is statistically significant while insignificant for Korea and Czech Republic. Theoretically, it should not be so as even under flexible inflation targeting central bank responds to inflation deviation and output gap; we think that the peculiar characteristics of emerging markets, like fear of floating, weak financial system and low level of central bank credibility make exchange rate important for these economies. In the second essay we investigate empirically the relative importance of monetary transmission channels for Brazil, Chile and Korea. This chapter uses monthly data from the inception of inflation targeting regime to 2009 M12. We use a SVAR model incorporating the main monetary transmission channels combined together instead of individual channels in isolation. The empirical results indicate that the exchange rate channel and the share price channel have higher relative importance than the traditional interest rate and credit channel for industrial production. The results are not much different in case of inflation, except for Korea. The high ranking of exchange rate and share price channel is in line with the results by Gudmundsson (2007), which finds that exchange rate channel might have overburdened in the wake of financial globalization.In the third chapter we investigate empirically the role of openness – real and financial – on the inflation dynamics of Brazil, Chile and Korea. The chapter uses monthly data from the inception of inflation targeting regime to the end month of 2009. In this chapter we employ the Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) technique. We use imports to GDP ratio as an indicator for real openness whereas Chinn and Ito index (KAOPEN) and total assets plus total liabilities to GDP ratio form the data set of Lane and Milesi-Ferretti are two proxies for financial openness. The chapter concludes that there exists, generally, a positive relationship between real openness and inflation. However, in case of financial globalization the results are inconclusive as they are sensitive to measurement method of financial globalization.

La thèse étudie la dynamique et la persistance de l’inflation dans les pays en développement, particulièrement ceux des pays de la Zone UEMOA, en mettant en exergue les spécificités de ces économies. Le premier chapitre, consacré à l’évaluation de la persistance, révèle que le degré de persistance de l'inflation est faible dans ces pays, ce qui constitue un atout pour les autorités monétaires. Dans le chapitre 2, il a été défini un cadre théorique plus approprié à l’analyse de la persistance de l’inflation dans les pays de la sous-région. L’approche a permis de montrer que le degré de persistance de l’inflation dans ces pays ne dépendait pas uniquement des politiques monétaire et de change, mais aussi négativement du poids du secteur vivrier local dans l’économie. Dans le chapitre 3, la thèse analyse les écarts d’inflation dans les pays membres de l’UEMOA, en examinant la β-convergence des différentiels d'inflation. Les estimations révèlent que, d’une part, les écarts d’inflation se sont fortement réduits à l’intérieur de l'Union et que, d’autre part, ils restent fortement persistants avec la zone Euro. Le chapitre 4 est consacré à l’évaluation du rôle des différents facteurs et utilise ensuite une spécification spatiale en panel, pour tester les effets de contagion entre pays. Les estimations indiquent une prédominance des facteurs globaux et des effets de contagion entre pays dont l'ampleur dépend du poids des exportations de chaque pays vers les autres pays de la sous région. / This thesis examines the inflation dynamics and persistence in developing countries, especially in the UEMOA zone, highlighting the specificities of these economies. The first chapter, reveals that the inflation persistence degree, in these countries, is low which represents an asset to the monetary authorities. In Chapter 2, it was defined a more appropriate theoretical framework to analyze the inflation persistence in the countries of the sub-region. The approach allowed to demonstrate that the inflation persistence degree in these countries is not only dependent on monetary and exchange rate policies, but also negatively to the weight of local food sector in the economy. Chapter 3, analyzes the inflation differentials in the UEMOA member countries, by examining the β - convergence of inflation differentials. Estimations show that the inflation differentials are greatly reduced within the Union and they are highly persistent with the Euro zone. Chapter 4, is devoted to assessing the role of various factors and then uses a spatial panel specification to test the spillover effect between countries. Estimations indicate a predominance of global factors and contagion between countries whose magnitude depends on the weight of exports to other countries in the sub-region.

El modelo Neo Keynesiano estándar ha sido una de las herramientas más influyentes en debates sobre dinámica macroeconómica, política monetaria y bienestar. Además, este modelo constituye una pieza fundamental en la elaboración de los modelos macroeconómicos que muchos bancos centrales utilizan para la simulación y predicción de variables económicas como la inflación y el crecimiento. El objetivo de esta tesis es evaluar la veracidad de las siguientes tres implicancias del modelo Neo Keynesiano estándar. Primero, con estabilidad de precios plena, las pérdidas de bienestar que se generan por las rigideces de precios deben ser cero. Segundo, la inflación es un fenómeno determinado por las expectativas. Tercero, el dinero no tiene un rol independiente en el mecanismo de transmisión de la política monetaria. / The standard New Keynesian (NK) model has become one of the most influential tools in discussions of macroeconomic dynamics, monetary policy and welfare. Moreover, it has emerged as the backbone of the medium scale macroeconomic models that several central banks use for simulation and forecasting purposes. This thesis evaluates the accuracy of the following three implications of the standard NK model. First, with full price stability the welfare losses resulting from price stickiness should be zero. Second, inflation is a forward-looking phenomenon. Third, money does not play an independent role in the monetary transmission mechanism.

La tesi di dottorato, composta da tre capitoli, si concentra sulla valutazione delle dinamiche di inflazione in Georgia e sulla previsione dei tassi di cambio nominali per i Paesi della European Eastern Partnership attraverso l’utilizzo di moderne tecniche econometriche. Nel primo capitolo, abbiamo svolto un’indagine sui modelli di previsione dei tassi di cambio e dell’inflazione. Questa indagine rivela che i modelli “factor-based and time-varying parameter” generano migliori previsioni rispetto ad altri modelli. Nel secondo capitolo, abbiamo approfondito le dinamiche di inflazione in Georgia utilizzando la New Keynesian Phillips Curve ibrida, inserita all’interno di un quadro di un modello “time-varying parameter (TVP)”. Una stima del modello TVP con volatilità stocastica mostra la persistenza di un’inflazione bassa durante il periodo 1996-2012. Un’analisi più approfondita dal 2003 mostra una volatilità crescente dell’inflazione. Inoltre, le stime del parametro evidenziano che la componente forward-looking del modello è importante a seguito dell’adozione di inflation targeting da parte della NBG a partire dal 2009. Nel terzo capitolo, abbiamo costruito dei modelli fattoriali, “Factor Vector Autoregressive” per prevedere i tassi di cambio nominali per i Paesi dell’European Eastern Partnership. Questi modelli prevedono meglio i tassi di cambio nominali rispetto ad un processo naïve come il random walk. / The Ph.D. thesis consist of three chapters on evaluating inflation dynamics in Georgia and modeling and forecasting nominal exchange rates for the European Eastern Partnership (EaP) countries using modern applied econometric techniques. In the first chapter, we survey of models those produce high predictive powers for forecasting exchange rates and inflation. This survey reveals that the factor-based and time-varying parameter (TVP) models generate superior forecasts relative to all other models. In the second chapter, we study inflation dynamics in Georgia using a hybrid New Keynesian Phillips Curve (NKPC) nested within a time-varying parameter (TVP) framework. Estimation of a TVP model with stochastic volatility shows low inflation persistence over the entire time span (1996-2012), while revealing increasing volatility of inflation shocks since 2003. Moreover, parameter estimates point to the forward-looking component of the model gaining importance following the National Bank of Georgia (NBG) adoption of inflation targeting in 2009. In the third chapter, we construct Factor Vector Autoregressive (FVAR) models to forecast nominal exchange rates for the EaP countries. This study provides better forecasts of nominal exchange rates than those produced by the random walk process.