Home bias, exchange rate disconnect and optimal exchange rate policy, Working Paper No. 701, Federal Reserve Bank of

This paper examines how much the central bank should adjust the interest rate in response to real exchange rate fluctuations. The paper first demonstrates in a two-country Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium (DSGE) model, that the home bias in consumption is important to duplicate the exchange rate volatility and exchange rate disconnect documented in the data. When home bias is high, the shock to Uncovered Interest-rate Parity (UIP) can substantially drive up exchange rate volatility while leaving the volatility of real macroeconomic variables, such as GDP, almost untouched. The model predicts that the volatility of the real exchange rate relative to that of GDP increases with the extent of home bias. This relation is supported by the data. A second-order accurate solution method is employed to find the optimal operational monetary policy rule. Our model suggests that the monetary authority should not seek to vigorously stabilize exchange rate fluctuations. In particular, when the central bank does not take a strong stance against the inflation rate, exchange rate stabilization may induce substantial welfare loss. The model does not detect welfare gain from the international monetary cooperation, which extends Obstfeld and Rogoff’s (2002) findings to a DSGE model