Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gxg78 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-25T05:27:20.839Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

New Evidence on the Forward Premium Puzzle

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 July 2016

Jacob Boudoukh
Affiliation:
[email protected], Arison School of Business, Interdisciplinary Center, Herzlia 46150, Israel
Matthew Richardson
Affiliation:
[email protected], New York University, Stern School of Business, New York, NY 10012, and National Bureau of Economic Research
Robert F. Whitelaw*
Affiliation:
[email protected], New York University, Stern School of Business, New York, NY 10012, and National Bureau of Economic Research.
*
*Corresponding author: [email protected]

Abstract

The forward premium anomaly (exchange rate changes are negatively related to interest rate differentials) is one of the most robust puzzles in financial economics. We recast the underlying parity relation in terms of lagged forward interest rate differentials, documenting a reversal of the anomalous sign on the coefficient in the traditional specification. We show that this novel evidence is consistent with recent empirical models of exchange rates that imply exchange rate changes depend on two key variables: the interest rate differential and the magnitude of the deviation of the current exchange rate from that implied by purchasing power parity.

Type
Research Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Michael G. Foster School of Business, University of Washington 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abuaf, N., and Jorion, P.. “Purchasing Power Parity in the Long Run.” Journal of Finance, 45 (1990), 157174.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bansal, R., and Dahlquist, M.. “The Forward Premium Puzzle: Different Tales from Developed and Emerging Economies.” Journal of International Economics, 51 (2000), 115144.Google Scholar
Bekaert, G. “The Time-Variation of Expected Returns and Volatility in Foreign Exchange Markets.” Journal of Business and Economic Statistics, 13 (1995), 397408.Google Scholar
Bekaert, G. “The Time-Variation of Risk and Return in Foreign Exchange Markets: A General Equilibrium Perspective.” Review of Financial Studies, 9 (1996), 427470.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bekaert, G., and Hodrick, R. J.. “On Biases in the Measurement of Foreign Exchange Risk Premiums.” Journal of International Money and Finance, 12 (1993), 115138.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bekaert, G., and Hodrick, R. J.. “Expectations Hypotheses Tests.” Journal of Finance, 56 (2001), 13571394.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bekaert, G.; Hodrick, R. J.; and Marshall, D. A.. “The Implications of First-Order Risk Aversion for Asset Market Risk Premiums.” Journal of Monetary Economics, 40 (1997), 467509.Google Scholar
Bekaert, G.; Min, W.; and Ying, Y.. “Uncovered Interest Rate Parity and the Term Structure of Interest Rates.” Journal of International Money and Finance, 26 (2007), 10381069.Google Scholar
Berge, T. J.; Jorda, O.; and Taylor, A. M.. “Currency Carry Trades.” NBER Working Paper No. 16491 (2010).Google Scholar
Berndt, E. R., and Savin, N. E.. “Conflict among Criteria for Testing Hypotheses in the Multivariate Linear Regression Model.” Econometrica, 45 (1977), 12631277.Google Scholar
Boudoukh, J., and Richardson, M.. “The Statistics of Long-Horizon Regressions Revisited.” Mathematical Finance, 4 (1994), 103119.Google Scholar
Brunnermeier, M.; Nagel, S.; and Pedersen, L.. “Carry Trades and Currency Crashes.” NBER Macroeconomics Annual, 23 (2008), 313348.Google Scholar
Burnside, A. C.; Eichenbaum, M.; Kleschelski, I.; and Rebelo, S.. “The Returns to Currency Speculation.” NBER Working Paper No. 12489 (2006).Google Scholar
Chinn, M., and Meredith, G.. “Testing Uncovered Interest Parity at Short and Long Horizons during the Post-Bretton Woods Era.” NBER Working Paper No. 11077 (2005).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chinn, M., and Quayyum, S.. “Long Horizon Uncovered Interest Parity Re-Assessed.” NBER Working Paper No. 18482 (2012).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clarida, R.; Davis, J.; and Pedersen, N.. “Currency Carry Trade Regimes: Beyond the Fama Regression.” Journal of International Money and Finance, 28 (2009), 13751389.Google Scholar
Engel, C. “The Forward Discount Anomaly and the Risk Premium: A Survey of Recent Evidence.” Journal of Empirical Finance, 3 (1996), 123192.Google Scholar
Engel, C., and West, K. D.. “Exchange Rates and Fundamentals.” Journal of Political Economy, 113 (2005), 485517.Google Scholar
Fama, E. F. “Forward and Spot Exchange Rates.” Journal of Monetary Economics, 14 (1984), 319338.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fama, E. F., and Gibbons, M.. “A Comparison of Inflation Forecasts.” Journal of Monetary Economics, 13 (1984), 327348.Google Scholar
Farhi, E.; Fraiberger, S.; Gabaix, X.; Ranciere, R.; and Verdelhan, A.. “Crash Risk in Currency Markets.” NBER Working Paper No. 15062 (2009).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Froot, K. A., and Ramadorai, T.. “Currency Returns, Intrinsic Value, and Institutional-Investor Flows.” Journal of Finance, 60 (2005), 15351566.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Graveline, J. J. “Exchange Rate Volatility and the Forward Premium Anomaly.” Working Paper, University of Minnesota (2006).Google Scholar
Hansen, L. P. “Large Sample Properties of Generalized Methods of Moments Estimators.” Econometrica, 50 (1982), 10291054.Google Scholar
Hansen, L. P., and Hodrick, R. J.. “Forward Exchange Rates as Optimal Predictors of Future Spot Rates: An Econometric Analysis.” Journal of Political Economy, 88 (1980), 829853.Google Scholar
Hodrick, R. J. The Empirical Evidence on the Efficiency of Forward and Futures Foreign Exchange Markets. Chur, Switzerland: Harwood Academic Publishers (1987).Google Scholar
Imbs, J.; Mumtaz, H.; Ravn, M.; and Rey, H.. “PPP Strikes Back: Aggregation and the Real Exchange Rate.” Quarterly Journal of Economics, 120 (2005), 143.Google Scholar
Jorda, O., and Taylor, A.. “The Carry Trade and Fundamentals: Nothing to Fear but FEER Itself.” Journal of International Economics, 88 (2012), 7490.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jorion, P., and Mishkin, F.. “A Multicountry Comparison of Term-Structure Forecasts at Long Horizons.” Journal of Financial Economics, 29 (1991), 5980.Google Scholar
Jurek, J. “Crash-Neutral Currency Carry Trades.” Journal of Financial Economics, 113 (2014), 325347.Google Scholar
Kim, Y. “Purchasing Power Parity in the Long Run: A Cointegration Approach.” Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, 22 (1990), 491503.Google Scholar
Lewis, K. K. “Puzzles in International Financial Markets.” In Handbook of International Economics, Vol. 3, Grossman, G. M. and Rogoff, K., eds. Amsterdam, Netherlands: Elsevier, North-Holland (1995).Google Scholar
Lothian, J., and Taylor, M.. “Real Exchange Rate Behavior: The Recent Float from the Perspective of the Past Two Centuries.” Journal of Political Economy, 104 (1996), 488509.Google Scholar
Lustig, H., and Verdelhan, A.. “The Cross-Section of Foreign Currency Risk Premia and Consumption Growth Risk.” American Economic Review, 97 (2007), 89117.Google Scholar
Mark, N. C., and Wu, Y.. “Rethinking Deviations from Uncovered Interest Rate Parity: The Role of Covariance Risk and Noise.” Economic Journal, 108 (1998), 16861706.Google Scholar
Meese, R. A., and Rogoff, K.. “Empirical Exchange Rate Models of the Seventies: Do They Fit Out of Sample?” Journal of International Economics, 14 (1983), 324.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Menkhoff, L.; Sarno, L.; Schmeling, M.; and Schrimpf, A.. “Carry Trades and Global Foreign Exchange Volatility.” Journal of Finance, 67 (2012), 681718.Google Scholar
Newey, W. K., and West, K. D.. “A Simple Positive Semi-Definite, Heteroskedasticity and Autocorrelation Consistent Covariance Matrix.” Econometrica, 51 (1987), 12331242.Google Scholar
Plantin, G., and Shin, H. S.. “Carry Trades and Speculative Dynamics.” Working Paper, Princeton University (2010).Google Scholar
Richardson, M., and Smith, T.. “Tests of Financial Models in the Presence of Overlapping Observations.” Review of Financial Studies, 4 (1992), 227254.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rogoff, K. “The Purchasing Power Parity Puzzle.” Journal of Economic Literature, 34 (1996), 647668.Google Scholar
Taylor, A. M. “A Century of Purchasing-Power Parity.” Review of Economics and Statistics, 84 (2002), 139150.Google Scholar
Wu, Y., and Zhang, H.. “Asymmetry in Forward Exchange Rate Bias: A Puzzling Result.” Economics Letters, 50 (1996), 407411.Google Scholar