The Current Account and Balance of Payments: Implications towards the Real Exchange Rate, GDP Growth, Asset Prices and Stability

Abstract

The Current Account and Balance of Payments: Implications towards the Real Exchange Rate, GDP Growth, Asset Prices and Stability Abstract in English In the aftermath of the global financial crisis, large global imbalances among countries' current account have been cited as a possible cause. The real exchange rate emerges as a key policy tool among countries within the research literature and in practice to manage a country's Balance of Payments indicators, despite mixed evidence. In this master thesis, we will construct a vector error correction model for cointegrating relationships utilizing the Johansen's test, using time series data for the US, UK, and Australia for the period 1973-2018. We examined the relationships between the real exchange rate, the current account, the financial account, net reserves, the interest rate, and openness to trade as well as employing Granger Causality tests. In the US, we found relationships between net reserves and both the current account and the real exchange rate. In the UK, the interest rate and the real exchange rate have a cointegrating relationship. In both the UK and Australia, we found a cointegrating relationship with the real exchange rate and current account. We examine the various theoretical and practical approaches towards viewing the Balance of Payments...