The presence of seasonal fluctuations (regular behavior along the year related to weather or institutional factors) invalidates monthly (quarterly) comparisons. In turn, since inter-annual variations depend on the comparison basis being used, they could provide very little information to the...

This paper presents and evaluates the hypothesis that emerging countries specialized in commodity production are prone to experience non orthogonal commercial and financial shocks. Specifically, we investigate a set of global macroeconomic variables that, in principle, could simultaneously...

The level of bankarization (access to and use of banking services) is relatively low in Argentina both in historical terms and compared with similarly developed countries. This is shown by indicators both of access to and use of banking services. This paper analyzes a unique database containing...

Economist usually think and work taking into account the temporal dimension of economic and financial processes. Time plays a key role in the economic decision making process and is a fundamental input for statistical models useful to analyze and predict social behavior. Thus time invades our...

The purpose of this paper is to assess whether the banking system, over and beyond its credit function, has a significant impact on per capita GDP by providing means of payment. An annual database of 85 countries spanning the 1980-2008 period is exploited to this end. On the descriptive front,...

This paper analyzes the evolution and differential scope of restrictions to financing for the companies surveyed by the Large Companies Survey (ENGE) of the National Institute of Statistics and Census (INDEC) during the period 1995-2003. The main purpose of this study is to differentiate results...

The role of the exchange rate under inflation targeting (IT) remains an unresolved issue in literature and policy discussions -and a challenge for central banks implementing IT, especially in developing countries. This paper aims at assessing whether there is a relation between the nominal...

The goal of this paper is to provide up-to-date worldwide evidence on the short-term relationship between credit changes and output changes. Standard correlation methods, state of-the-art panel Granger causality tests, and panel regressions were applied on a maximum sample of 144 countries over...

We use a variation on the business cycle accounting method of Chari, Kehoe and McGrattan to study the business cycle in Argentina from 1972 to 2006. We use capital utilization as a household decision variable to be able to better extract the wedge that functions as a tax on capital. Applying the...

The principal components methodology allows us to summarize the relevant information of a series of economic indicators. In this paper, this methodology is used on series commonly used by the BCRA to follow up aggregate demand and supply conditions. The principal components are assessed in terms...