Offshore Currency Markets: Non-Deliverable Forwards (NDFs) in Asia


Book Description

Non-deliverable forward (NDF) markets in many Asian emerging market currencies are large, rapidly growing, and often exceed onshore markets in transaction volume. NDFs tend to price significant depreciation during market stress episodes including COVID-19. Spillovers from NDFs to onshore markets are a policymaker concern. Our analysis shows that influences tend to run both ways after controlling for differences in timezones between markets. For the COVID-19 pandemic there is some evidence of NDFs leading onshore markets for a few currencies. Policy approaches to NDFs vary widely across Asia from close integration with onshore markets to severe restrictions on NDF trading.




Investing in Asian Offshore Currency Markets


Book Description

The offshore currency market is a foundation of offshore bond market, helping well-established corporations in global financing. Following the global financial tsunami in 2008 and European debt crisis in 2009-2011, this book aims to document the latest issues, challenges, trends and thoughts relating to offshore currency markets in Asia.




Measures to Limit the offshore Use of Currencies


Book Description

Several Asian emerging market economies have recently adopted measures to limit the offshore trading of their currencies. This paper provides a general overview of such measures and evaluates the experiences of selected countries that resorted to such measures. It concludes that the measures could be effective if they were comprehensive and effectively enforced, and were accompanied by consistent macroeconomic policies and structural reforms. Such measures, however, could adversely affect investor confidence, financial market development, and nonspeculative economic and financial activities, and impose administrative burden on all parties involved.







Development and Functioning of FX Markets in Asia and the Pacific


Book Description

Global foreign exchange (FX) trading volume in traditional FX products and derivatives in Asia and the Pacific has expanded rapidly over the last 15 years, more so than in other regions. Asian currencies also have experienced exceptional growth in offshore turnover, including that of non-deliverable forwards (NDFs). Trading activity on this scale, spread across many countries and currencies, underscores the need for a smoothly functioning infrastructure and exceptional risk management processes. While settlement risks are mitigated for the vast majority of turnover through systems such as CLS Bank, the Asia-Pacific region would benefit by having more countries and currencies become CLS-enabled or tradable under other payment-versus-payment (PVP) systems. Although their volatility was less pronounced than during the global financial crisis, FX markets in the region experienced added turbulence during the “taper tantrum” of 2013. High-turnover currencies tended to depreciate more after the taper announcements, although volatility rose more sharply in currencies with low turnover. The FX market is a prominent venue for carry trades that are subject to crash risk. While there is some evidence of herding behaviour exacerbating this risk over the past decade, the measures calibrated more recently do not suggest exceptional crowding into carry trades ahead of the “taper tantrum” in 2013. At the same time, our measures of crowdedness for the carry trade show considerable variation over time. It might be useful to make crowdedness measures publicly available.Full publication: 'http://ssrn.com/abstract=2668657' Cross-Border Financial Linkages: Challenges for Monetary Policy and Financial Stability.




Non-Deliverable Forwards


Book Description

Global turnover in non-deliverable forwards (NDFs) continues to rise in aggregate. But the paths of NDF markets have diverged across currencies: renminbi internationalisation has led to rapid displacement of NDFs by deliverable forwards, while the NDF market has retained or even gained in importance in other emerging market economy currencies. Policy reforms to reduce systemic risk in derivatives markets are changing the microstructure of the NDF market.




Policy Responses to Capital Flows in Emerging Markets


Book Description

Staff Discussion Notes showcase the latest policy-related analysis and research being developed by individual IMF staff and are published to elicit comment and to further debate. These papers are generally brief and written in nontechnical language, and so are aimed at a broad audience interested in economic policy issues. This Web-only series replaced Staff Position Notes in January 2011.




Chinese Yuan Renminbi Derivative Products


Book Description

Since late 2002 there have been many disputes and discussions around the world on whether or not the Chinese yuan (CNY), or renminbi (RMB), should be revalued. Based on various arguments and discussions, the CNY has been expected to be revalued worldwide, as evidenced by the significant premiums for the CNY non-deliverable forwards in the offshore marketplace. With the CNY revaluation perspectives, hundreds of billions of US dollars have been invested in various types of CNY-related derivatives products. The purpose of this book is not to tell the reader whether the RMB should be revalued, or by how much it should be revalued, as these questions are the work of economists. Instead, as a derivatives specialist with more than te years' experience in the international financial market and with working experience in China in the past few years, the author presents trading of CNY-related derivatives products in the offshore marketplace. The book is organized into five parts. The first part familiarizes readers with the Chinese economy in transition and the Chinese financial market, so that they can make their own judgment as to whether or not the CNY should be revalued. Part II presents major foreign exchange derivatives trading in organized exchanges and the over-the-counter marketplace around the world. Part III reviews what foreign exchange products were involved both before and during the Asian financial crisis, because many of them were used to speculate or hedge against devaluations of the Asian currencies. Part IV studies various CNY-related derivatives products and embedded derivatives products. Finally, Part V examines the possible impacts of these derivatives products on the CNYexchange rate, based on the experiences of other currencies such as the Korean won and the New Taiwan dollar.




Non-Deliverable Forwards


Book Description

Non-deliverable forwards (NDFs) allow investors and borrowers to take positions in currencies that are subject to official controls. Turnover in NDFs has risen in recent years as non-residents use them to hedge increasing investment in local currency bonds. Pricing in deliverable forward and NDF markets is segmented, with NDFs leading in times of strain. Experience shows that NDF markets tend to fade away gradually after liberalisation. But, looking ahead, market centralisation might reduce the costs of maintaining them. In a unique development, offshore deliverable renminbi forwards are gaining on the established NDF.




Emerging Market Economies and Financial Globalization


Book Description

In the past, foreign shocks arrived to national economies mainly through trade channels, and transmissions of such shocks took time to come into effect. However, after capital globalization, shocks spread to markets almost immediately. Despite the increasing macroeconomic dangers that the situation generated at emerging markets in the South, nobody at the North was ready to acknowledge the pro-cyclicality of the financial system and the inner weakness of “decontrolled” financial innovations because they were enjoying from the “great moderation.” Monetary policy was primarily centered on price stability objectives, without considering the mounting credit and asset price booms being generated by market liquidity and the problems generated by this glut. Mainstream economists, in turn, were not majorly attracted in integrating financial factors in their models. External pressures on emerging market economies (EMEs) were not eliminated after 2008, but even increased as international capital flows augmented in relevance thereafter. Initially economic authorities accurately responded to the challenge, but unconventional monetary policies in the US began to create important spillovers in EMEs. Furthermore, in contrast to a previous surge in liquidity, funds were now transmitted to EMEs throughout the bond market. The perspective of an increase in US interest rates by the FED is generating a reversal of expectations and a sudden flight to quality. Emerging countries’ currencies began to experience higher volatility levels, and depreciation movements against a newly strong US dollar are also increasingly observed. Consequently, there are increasing doubts that the “unexpected” favorable outcome observed in most EMEs at the aftermath of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) would remain.