01893cas a2200253 a 4500 AALejournalIMF002807 230101c9999 xx r poo 0 0eng d 5.00 USD 9781451841794 1018-5941 BD-DhAAL BD-DhAAL Kuijs, Louis. Exchange Rates in Central Europe : A Blessing or a Curse? / Louis Kuijs, Alain Borghijs. Washington, D.C. : International Monetary Fund, 2004. 1 online resource (29 pages) IMF Working Papers <strong>Off-Campus Access:</strong> No User ID or Password Required <strong>On-Campus Access:</strong> No User ID or Password Required Electronic access restricted to authorized BRAC University faculty, staff and students Central European accession countries (CECs) are currently considering when to adopt the euro. From the perspective of macroeconomic stabilization, the cost or benefit of giving up a flexible exchange rate depends on the types of asymmetric shocks hitting the economy and the ability of the exchange rate to act as a shock absorber. Economic theory suggests that flexible exchange rates are useful in absorbing asymmetric real shocks but unhelpful in the case of monetary and financial shocks. For five CECs-the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, the Slovak Republic, and Slovenia-empirical results on the basis of a structural VAR suggest that in the CECs the exchange rate appears to have served as much or more as an unhelpful propagator of monetary and financial shocks than as a useful absorber of real shocks. Mode of access: Internet Borghijs, Alain. IMF Working Papers; Working Paper ; No. 2004/002 Full text available on IMF http://elibrary.imf.org/view/journals/001/2004/002/001.2004.issue-002-en.xml IMF e-Library