This paper characterizes the integration patterns of international currency unions (such as the CFA Franc zone). We empirically explore different features of currency unions, and compare them to countries with sovereign monies by examining the criteria for Mundell’s concept of an optimum currency area. We find that members of currency unions are more integrated than countries with their own cur...

Urinary excretion of f32-microglobulin (f2M) is a widely used test of renal proximal tubular function. /32M is known to be unstable in normal urine with a pH <5.5. The results of a study of /32M excretion in patients receiving gentamicin suggested that 32M might be more unstable in pathological urine. A series of experiments was designed to define the extent, variability, and mechanism of its i...

One simple method of recognizing paper currencies has been introduced. It considers different dimensions, areas, Euler numbers, correlations between images as features. It uses Weighted Euclidean Distance for classification. The method uses the case of Saudi Arabian paper currency as a model currency under consideration. It uses fifth series of currency, issued by Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency ...

 As the number of independent countries increases and their economies become more integrated, we would expect to observe more multi-country currency :::union:::s. This paper explores the pros and cons for different countries to adopt as an anchor the US Dollar, the Euro or the Yen. In addition, it addresses the question of how co-movement of outputs and prices would respond to the formation of ...

This paper examines how U.S. multinational firms are affected by foreign currency movements. In light of detailed exchange rate data, we find that 29% of our sample of 935 U.S. firms with real operations in foreign countries is significantly affected by currency movements between 1990 and 2001. Results show moreover that U.S. stock returns react asymmetrically to currency movements. By introduc...

Using a long dataset on openness and productivity this paper tests the influence of openness on TFP growth and per capita growth since 1870 for 16 industrialized countries. It is shown, in simple regressions, that growth is by and large independent of openness. However, once the interaction between openness and foreign knowledge is allowed for, productivity is positively affected by openness. J...

This paper examines the effects of inflation and currency substitution volatility on the average rates of inflation and currency substitution for twelve emerging market economies. Using a bivariate GARCH-in-Mean model, which accommodates for asymmetric and spillover effects of inflation and currency substitution innovations on their volatilities, we find that for the majority of the countries i...

The Interactions between Debt and Currency Crises – Common Causes or Contagion? In contrast to the well-known twin currency and banking crises the literature has so far neglected a second type of twin crises, the simultaneous occurrence of currency and debt crises. The decision of a government to devalue and/or to default is closely interlinked through the government’s intertemporal budget cons...

The devaluation of the Mexican peso of 1995 along with the more recent financial crises in emerging economies are viewed as systematic outcomes of the operation of free currency markets. The hypothesis is that there exists a distortion in free currency markets that makes developing countries systematically misallocate resources. The distortion lies in “asymmetric reputation” that leads to subst...