African and Policy Development and Review Departments Sources of Nominal Exchange Rate Fluctuations in South Africa

This Working Paper should not be reported as representing views of the IMF. The views expressed in this Working Paper are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of the IMF or IMF policy. Working Papers describe research in progress by the author(s) and are published to elicit comments and to further debate. This paper investigates the sources of fluctuations in the rand-U.S. dollar exchange rate in 2001 and 2002 using an empirical exchange rate model which identifies aggregate supply, aggregate demand, and nominal disturbances as possible sources for exchange rate fluctuations. According to our results, nominal disturbances explain by far most of the rand depreciation in the final quarter of 2001. The fact that the nominal effective exchange rate also depreciated sharply suggests the nominal disturbances were domestically generated. From a preliminary examination of the relative movements in policy interest rates in South Africa and the United States, along with growth rates in both narrow and broad monetary aggregates in South Africa, it is difficult to isolate the underlying cause of the nominal disturbances in 2001 and 2002