Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/36714 
Year of Publication: 
2010
Series/Report no.: 
DIW Discussion Papers No. 973
Publisher: 
Deutsches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung (DIW), Berlin
Abstract: 
The global imbalances of the 2000s and the recent global financial crisis are intimately connected. Both originate in the combination of economic policies adopted by the two key economies, the US and China. Global financial markets served as a transmission belt, both during the boom as during the bust. In the US, the interaction among the Fed's monetary stance, global real interest rates, distorted incentives in credit markets, and financial innovation created the mix of conditions which first drove growth, but then made the US the epicenter of the global financial crisis. Exchange rate and other economic policies followed by emerging markets such as China and the oil-exporting countries contributed to the US ability to borrow cheaply abroad and thereby finance its unsustainable housing bubble during the upswing. But we find that the key drivers of asset prices are global liquidity conditions. Central banks flooded the markets with ample liquidity. Mopping up this excess liquidity will be one major task for central banks worldwide, which needs to be done in a coordinated fashion. Moreover, our analysis has shown that liquidity will first show up in asset price inflation and only later in consumer goods inflation. This renders it difficult for central bank to exit from their current very expansive monetary policy stance if they continue to focus only on price stability.
Subjects: 
Asset prices
China
current account adjustment
global liquidity
oil prices
savings glut
monetary policy
policy coordination
JEL: 
E21
E43
E52
F32
F42
Q43
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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