KREDIT und KAPITAL - Issue 2/1998


Contents


Articles

Nautz, Dieter
Wie brauchbar sind Multiplikatorprognosen für die Geldmengensteuerung der Bundesbank?

Schimmelpfennig, Axel
Die deutsche Vereinigung und das Leistungsbilanzdefizit

Bieta, Volker and Gelbhaar, Siegfried
Öffentliche Finanzinstitute als subventionspolitische Agenten

Freisleben, Bernd and Ripper, Klaus
Statistische Analyse des Zinsprozeßrisikos von Anleihen und zinsderivativen Wertpapieren


Reports

Feldmann, Horst
Das geldpolitische Instrumentarium des Europäischen Systems der Zentralbanken - Eine Analyse des EWI- Vorschlags


Book Reviews

Traud, Gertrud Rosa
Optimale Währungsräume und europäische Integration (Christoph Harff)

Knies, Carl
Das Geld. Darlegung der Grundlehren von dem Gelde, mit einer Vorerörterung über das kapital und die Übertragung der Nutzungen. Faksimile- Nachdruck der 1873 erschienenen Erstausgabe mit einem Kommentarband mit Beiträgen von Karl Häuser, Gottfried Eisermann und Kiichiro Yagi (Dieter Fritz- Aßmus)


Summaries

Nautz, Dieter
"How useful are Money Multiplier Forecasts for the Monetary Targeting of the Bundesbank?"

The controllability of monetary aggregates is often analysed using money multiplier forecast equations. The present paper investigates the usefulness of this approach. Cointegration analysis and Granger causality tests reveal that German monetary aggregates are not controlled via changes in the monetary base. Therefore, it is pointless to analyze the Bundesbank's monetary targeting applying money multiplier forecasts.

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Schimmelpfennig, Axel
"German Reunification and its Current Account Deficit"

The German current account balance has moved from surplus to deficit in the course of unification. A theoretical model for the current account, encompassing the elasticities, the monetary, and the absorptions approach is set up and tested for Germany, using Cointegration analysis. In addition, private savings are modelled by a life- cycle model nested in a model of overlapping generations. A country's private and government savings are identified as the major factors driving the current account. Private Savings are explained by the specified model. The concept of a primary deficit as well as the concept of half- and full- dept- cycles are used to argue that the German current account deficit can easily move from sustainability to unsustainability in the near future.

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Bieta, Volker and Gelbhaar, Siegfried
"Public Financial Institutions as Subsidy- Policy Agents Mechanisms for Political Lendings in "Pooling/ Separating States of Balance""

Lendings made for subsidy- policy purposes, including the implementation of such lendings, often confront the implementing credit institutions with a complex uncertainty. One explanation of this uncertainty concerns the debtor's behaviour, because the lender does not always know the type of borrower negotiating the loan or the way in which the borrower will behave after the credit agreement has been concluded. Another source of uncertainty is the process of political and internal banking co-ordination. From the credit institution's point of view, this requires an appropriate and low- cost management of potential uncertainty factors. But on the other hand, the sovereign rights of potential recipients of promotion funds are not to be unduly restricted so as to ensure that the economic policy goals to be attainted through the lending operation can actually be achieved.

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Freisleben, Bernd und Ripper, Klaus
"Statistical Analysis of the Interest Process Risk and of Interest- Based Derivative Securities"

This contribution analyses the interest process risk pertaining to fixed- interest- bearing loans and to interest- based derivative securities. On the basis of an analysis of main components, it shows for the German capital market that the risk component involved in portfolios of fixed- interest- bearing securities can be traced back to three major factors. The results of the analysis of main- components are related to ordinary risk indicators. It turns out that the Fischer- Weil- duration suffices as risk indicator for most portfolios of fixed- interest- bearing securities. Only where portfolios consist of interest- based products for the most part is the use of the more costly key- rate- duration justified.

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Reports

Feldmann, Horst
"The Monetary Policy Instruments of the European System of Central Banks - An Analysis of the EMI Proposal -"

In 1997, the European Monetary Institute (EMI) submitted a proposal on the monetary policy instruments of the European System of Central Banks. This proposal includes three types of instruments: open-market operations, standing facilities minimum reserves. The paper analyses all three types of instruments. Firstly, it demonstrates to what extent these instruments differ from the ones the Bundesbank has at its disposal at present. Secondly, it evaluates the proposed instruments, using as criteria efficiency of monetary policy, conformity with the principles of a market economy, and decentralized application. Finally, the paper Shows which questions still need to be clarified and what kinds of monetary policy risk are associated with the European Monetary Union.

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