Integrating financial markets in East Asia

Financial markets in east Asia have experienced substantial transformation and turmoil in recent years which has had an effect on the pattern of integration in the region. The paper assesses patterns of common variability in daily changes in interest rates, stock prices and exchange rates in the region using principal component and common factor analysis. It concludes that common variability is greatest in stock prices and exchange rates, that particular patterns of common variability have occurred in both crisis and non-crisis periods at various levels of regional aggregation, and that there is little evidence of a “yen bloc”