The 'Real' Explanation of the PPP Puzzle

Nicholas Ford and Charles Horioka ()

No 22198, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: This article shows that global financial markets cannot, by themselves, achieve net transfers of financial capital and real interest rate equalisation across countries and that the integration of both global financial markets and global goods markets is needed to achieve net transfers of capital and real interest rate equalisation across countries. Thus, frictions (barriers to mobility) in one or both of these markets can impede the net transfer of capital between countries, produce the Feldstein and Horioka (1980) finding of high saving-investment correlations, and prevent real interest rates from being equalised across countries. Moreover, frictions in global goods markets can explain why real exchange rates deviate from PPP (purchasing power parity) for extended periods of time and can therefore also explain the PPP puzzle. Thus, we are able to resolve 2 of Obstfeld and Rogoff’s (2000) “6 major puzzles in macroeconomics” with essentially the same explanation.

JEL-codes: E40 F21 F31 F32 F36 G15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-mac and nep-opm
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (10)

Published as Nicholas Ford & Charles Yuji Horioka, 2017. "The ‘real’ explanation of the PPP puzzle," Applied Economics Letters, vol 24(5), pages 325-328.

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Journal Article: The ‘real’ explanation of the PPP puzzle (2017)
Working Paper: The 'Real' Explanation of the PPP Puzzle (2016)
Working Paper: The ‘Real’ Explanation of the PPP Puzzle (2016)
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