A Roadmap For East Asian Monetary Integration

Numerous ideas for monetary and financial cooperation in East Asia have been proposed both within and outside the region since the financial crisis in Asia. Despite this strong level of interest, however, there are few studies that aim to comprehensively address the issue from multiple perspectives. This insightful book redresses the balance and illustrates how East Asian countries plan to take advantage of their rising economic power in rearranging the new international monetary and financial order in the post-crisis era. The expert contributors examine the history, conditions and current efforts towards monetary integration in Asia and explore possible future paths, highlighting the roles and perspectives of East Asian countries in the integration process. They consider how East Asian economies could establish their own zone of monetary stability, and show that monetary stability cannot be separately addressed from the issues of economic growth and solidarity. Without economic growth and solidarity, there would be no purpose in pursuing monetary integration, therefore all three challenges must be simultaneously addressed. Against this backdrop, the book tackles the issues of East Asian monetary integration underpinned by the broad framework of economic growth and solidarity. Scholars of economics, monetary integration, Asian studies and regionalism will find this book to be an illuminating and thought-provoking read.

Towards Monetary and Financial Integration in East Asia is an important book. East Asia, led by China, has been and will continue to be the largest, most rapidly growing region in the world. Major global imbalances persist, with East Asia in large surplus. Yet East Asian financial and monetary integration is only in the early stages of what will necessarily be a long-run process. These 14 essays by different authors address, in six Parts, fundamental long-run issues and prospects. These include the development of a regional financial architecture, liquidity provision and crisis management, surveillance mechanisms, exchange rate arrangements, currency baskets, an Asian Currency Unit, and ultimately even a single currency. The implications of the rise of China and the role of Japan underlie much of these analyses. However imperfect, the EU is the dominant relevant experience for East Asian financial and monetary integration. It is important to understand, as the authors do, that it took 47 years from the EU s nascent founding to the establishment of the euro, and that economic integration has preceded political integration. This book importantly addresses such basic issues in this time frame and with an appreciation of the political economy difficulties of financial integration. Hugh Patrick, Columbia University, US The book edited by Professors Hamada, Reszat, and Volz gives a comprehensive overview of the current status and challenges of economic integration in East Asia. Monetary and financial integration in East Asia has proceeded gradually but steadily since the Asian financial crisis of 1997 98. The book is an authoritative cutting-edge collection of papers in respective topics which brings the reader to the frontier of the literature. Takatoshi Ito, University of Tokyo, Japan This indispensable book provides a comprehensive analysis of monetary and financial integration in East Asia. It assesses the steps already taken toward financial integration and brings forward different proposals for future exchange rate arrangements in what has now become the world s most dynamic region. With contributions from distinguished experts this timely book evaluates the economic and politico-economic arguments and conditions for monetary and financial integration in East Asia. It explores how and to what extent the countries of the region can integrate despite their heterogeneity and their underlying political tensions. Drawing on the European experiences, this book analyzes the economic logic of monetary and financial integration in East Asia and its political feasibility. This invaluable broad analysis will be of interest to academic researchers, students, policy-makers and professional economists working on matters of international economic cooperation, common currency areas, international open economy macroeconomics, and East Asian integration.

East Asian exchange rates have become a global flashpoint. U.S. policymakers blame artificially low Asian currency values for global imbalances, including America's ballooning current account deficit. The solution, they argue, lies in some combination of greater exchange rate flexibility and the appreciation of Asian currencies against the dollar. Asian officials recognize the need to let their exchange rates rise, but they fear that would hamper growth and cut sharply into the value of their dollar reserves. Toward an East Asian Exchange Rate Regime offers a timely and comprehensive analysis of the resulting debates, drawing on expertise from China, Japan, South Korea, and the United States. The introduction reviews the issues at stake, sketches a variety of proposed exchange rate regimes, and discusses comparisons between East Asia and the West. Subsequent chapters examine the connection between global financial imbalances and East Asian monetary cooperation, China's potential role in regional coordination, the relationship between monetary and trade integration, and different paths toward regional cooperation. Authoritative yet concise, this is an essential primer on East Asian monetary integration. Contributors include Gongpil Choi (Korean Institute of Finance, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco), Masahiro Kawai (University of Tokyo, Asian Development Bank), Kwanho Shin (Korea University), Yunjong Wang (SK Institute), Masaru Yoshitomi (RIETI,Tokyo), and Yongding Yu (Chinese Academy of Social Sciences).

The book analyses the Asian experience from both Asian and European perspectives.

East Asia's Monetary Future is an illuminating and valuable work which uniquely focuses on a long-term monetary view of the region. There are multiple and varied future scenarios which can be applied to this region - an enlarged Singapore-Brunei currency area, a greater China monetary bloc and even a Northeast Asian bloc comprising Japan and Korea. Leading scholars from East Asia, Europe and the US contribute valuable new insights to the key questions facing the organization and future of the monetary system in East Asia. Central questions discussed and analysed in the book include, amongst others: should the region move towards monetary union? Should countries peg their exchange rates to the US dollar? Is complete dollarization an option for East Asia? The authors argue that, having realized price stability over the last twenty years, in contrast to Latin America and Africa, the next logical step would be the gradual formation of various currency blocs within the region. This comprehensive discussion of the fundamental issues at stake will ensure the book's appeal to academics and researchers of Asian studies and financial economics. Financial experts working in this area and policymakers will also find much of interest to them within this book.

An investigation into monetary cooperation in East Asia that examines options ranging from informal policy coordination to the introduction of a common currency. East Asian countries were notably uninterested in regional monetary integration until the late 1990s, when the Asian financial crisis revealed the fragility of the region's exchange rate arrangements and highlighted the need for a stronger regional financial architecture. Since then, the countries of East Asia have begun taking steps to explore monetary and financial cooperation, establishing such initiatives as regular consultations among finance ministers and central bank governors and the pooling of foreign exchange reserves. In this book, Ulrich Volz investigates the prospects for monetary cooperation and integration in East Asia, using state-of-the-art theoretical and empirical tools to analyze the most promising policy options. Volz points out that monetary cooperation can be defined broadly to include options ranging from informal policy consultations to European-style monetary union. He recommends a gradual approach toward monetary integration in East Asia, one that pursues less extensive forms of monetary cooperation before tackling such highly challenging projects as a regional exchange rate system or a regional monetary union. The simpler, less demanding forms of policy coordination would, Volz argues, allow East Asian countries to develop an integrationist spirit and gain experience in cooperation. Monetary integration is not an end in itself, Volz reminds us, but a means to promote economic and financial development and create a stable macroeconomic environment that is conducive to investment and growth. After providing an in-depth analysis of the costs and benefits of monetary integration, Volz examines different options for East Asian countries. He then proposes a strategy whereby countries first opt for a managed float of exchange rates guided by a regional currency basket into which an "Asian currency unit" is introduced as a virtual parallel currency to circulate alongside national currencies.

At the Ninth ASEAN Summit in Bali on 7 October 2003, the leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations agreed to establish an ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) by 2020. It is envisaged that the AEC would be a single market and production base, with a free flow of goods and services, investments, capital and skilled labour. An integrated ASEAN with a sizeable market of over 500 million people could become an alternative to China as a regional production base for MNCs. Although there are roadmaps for the fast-track integration of eleven priority sectors, an overall longer-term roadmap needs to be formulated to realize the AEC. This book addresses the main issues.