| This dissertation studies two phenomena often faced by economies going through macroeconomic fluctuations. First, the dissertation studies the circumstances that bring a secondary currency into circulation in a given country. Second, the dissertation studies export responses to real exchange rate fluctuations. Many cases exist of multiple currency usage throughout history. What are the determinants of multiple currency usage and what is the effect on economic activity? We address these issues in Chapter 1 empirically, using individual-level surveys collected by the authors in Argentina during 2002 and 2003. The evidence supports the theoretically predicted determinants of secondary currency acceptability put forth in monetary theory. In particular we find that the acceptability of the secondary currency increases when the supply of national currency is low, the relative transaction cost of the secondary currency is low, and the individual trading technologies are less effective. Moreover we find that the acceptability of the secondary currency has real effects on economic activity. Among those who use the secondary currency the monthly gain is more than 15 percent of the average Argentine's monthly income. This effect aggregates to 0.6 percent of GDP. Do exports expand or contract after depreciations or appreciations? If so, by how much? And do they react differently to real fluctuations of different magnitudes? Chapter 2 estimates the real exchange rate elasticity of exports with a sample of 136 countries for the period 1981--1997. Exploiting variation within country pairs in the real bilateral exchange rate and trade flows over the sampled period, we estimate an average significant real exchange rate elasticity of exports of 0.06. Even though the statistical relationship between export flows and real exchange rates is not found to be overwhelming, we find significant but small non linearities in the real exchange rate elasticity of exports. These non linearities imply decreasing elasticities for larger real depreciations which is consistent with theories of credit constraints activated during large depreciations. |
