EconPapers    
Economics at your fingertips  
 

Why Do Emerging Economies Borrow in Foreign Currency?

Olivier Jeanne

No 2003/177, IMF Working Papers from International Monetary Fund

Abstract: This paper explores the hypothesis that the dollarization of liabilities in emerging market economies is the result of a lack of monetary credibility. I present a model in which firms choose the currency composition of their debts so as to minimize their probability of default. Decreasing monetary credibility can induce firms to dollarize their liabilities, even though this makes them vulnerable to a depreciation of the domestic currency. The channel is different from the channel studied in the earlier literature on sovereign debt, and it applies to both private and public debt. The paper presents some empirical evidence and discusses policy implications.

Keywords: WP; foreign currency; monetary policy; exchange rate; short-term debt; Foreign currency debt; Liability Dollarization; Monetary Credibility; currency composition; debt structure; results from a lack; debt contract; currency peg; long-term debt; dollar debt; Currencies; Domestic debt; Self-employment; Conventional peg; Southeast Asia (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 38
Date: 2003-09-01
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (95)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/cat/longres.aspx?sk=16763 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Why Do Emerging Economies Borrow in Foreign Currency? (2003) Downloads
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:imf:imfwpa:2003/177

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/pubs/ord_info.htm

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in IMF Working Papers from International Monetary Fund International Monetary Fund, Washington, DC USA. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Akshay Modi ().

 
Page updated 2025-03-30
Handle: RePEc:imf:imfwpa:2003/177