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International Risk Sharing is Better Than You Think (or Exchange Rates are Much Too Smooth)

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  • Michael W. Brandt
  • John H. Cochrane
  • Pedro Santa-Clara

Abstract

Exchange rates depreciate by the difference between the domestic and foreign marginal utility growths. Exchange rates vary a lot , as much as 10% per year. However, equity premia imply that marginal utility growths vary much more, by at least 50% per year. This means that marginal utility growths must be highly correlated across countries -- international risk sharing is better than you think. Conversely, if risks really are not shared internationally, exchange rates should vary more than they do -- exchange rates are much too smooth. We calculate an index of international risk sharing that formalizes this intuition in the context of both complete and incomplete capital markets. Our results suggest that risk sharing is indeed very high across several pairs of countries.

Suggested Citation

  • Michael W. Brandt & John H. Cochrane & Pedro Santa-Clara, 2001. "International Risk Sharing is Better Than You Think (or Exchange Rates are Much Too Smooth)," NBER Working Papers 8404, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:8404
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    Cited by:

    1. Anna Pavlova & Roberto Rigobon, 2007. "Asset Prices and Exchange Rates," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 20(4), pages 1139-1180.
    2. Cappiello, Lorenzo & De Santis, Roberto A., 2005. "Explaining exchange rate dynamics: the uncovered equity return parity condition," Working Paper Series 529, European Central Bank.
    3. Ravi Bansal, 2007. "Long-run risks and financial markets," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, vol. 89(Jul), pages 283-300.
    4. Narayana R. Kocherlakota & Luigi Pistaferri, 2007. "Household Heterogeneity and Real Exchange Rates," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 117(519), pages 1-25, March.
    5. Roche, M.J. & Moore. M.J., 2002. "Volatile and persistent real exchange rates without the contrivance of sticky prices," Economics Department Working Paper Series n1160402, Department of Economics, National University of Ireland - Maynooth.
    6. Perron, Pierre & Wada, Tatsuma, 2009. "Let's take a break: Trends and cycles in US real GDP," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(6), pages 749-765, September.
    7. Shu Wu, 2007. "Interest Rate Risk and the Forward Premium Anomaly in Foreign Exchange Markets," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 39(2‐3), pages 423-442, March.
    8. Hanno Lustig, 2005. "Investing in Foreign Currency is like Betting on your Intertemporal Marginal Rate of Substitution (joint with Adrien Verdelhan, BU, forthcoming in Papers and Proceedings JEEA)," UCLA Economics Online Papers 368, UCLA Department of Economics.
    9. Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou, 2004. "Implied Foreign Exchange Risk Premia," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 10(2), pages 321-338, June.
    10. Timothy K. Chue, 2004. "The Spirit of Capitalism and International Risk Sharing," Econometric Society 2004 Far Eastern Meetings 589, Econometric Society.
    11. Brandt, Michael W. & Santa-Clara, Pedro, 2002. "Simulated likelihood estimation of diffusions with an application to exchange rate dynamics in incomplete markets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(2), pages 161-210, February.

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    JEL classification:

    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates
    • G15 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - International Financial Markets

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