TY  - JOUR
AU  - Bordo,Michael D.
AU  - Schwartz,Anna J.
TI  - What has Foreign Market Intervention Since the Plaza Agreement Accomplished?
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 3562
PY  - 1991
Y2  - September 1991
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w3562
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w3562.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Michael D. Bordo
Department of Economics
Rutgers University
New Jersey Hall
75 Hamilton Street
New Brunswick, NJ 08901
Tel: 732/822-7152
Fax: 732/932-7416
E-Mail: bordo@econ.rutgers.edu

Anna J. Schwartz
NBER
365 Fifth Ave, 5th Floor
New York, NY  10016
Tel: 212/817-7957
Fax: 212/817-1597
E-Mail: aschwartz@gc.cuny.edu
AB  - We review the conduct and scale of official intervention by monetary authorities in the U.S.A., Japan, and West Germany since the Plaza Agreement. Relative to trading volume and the stock of internationally traded assets denominated in foreign currencies, intervention is small--scale and sporadic, hence at best limited to transitory effects. It does not appear to reduce volatility of daily exchange rates. Monetary authorities gamble that they will not suffer losses on their foreign currency holdings. Evidence in favor of sterilized foreign exchange market intervention as a way of conveying information to the private sector is far from convincing. Since changes in relative monetary growth rates are sufficient to alter bilateral exchange rates, monetary authorities can achieve their exchange rate preferences with domestic monetary policy, but at the cost of Possible distortionary effects on monetary growth rates, domestic interest rates, and international capital flows.
ER  -