Mishkin • Instructor’s Manual for The Economics of Money, Banking, and Financial Markets, Twelfth Edition 33
Chapter 17
The Foreign Exchange Market
Chapter 17 explains behavior in the foreign exchange market by using a modern asset-market
approach to exchange rate determination. This asset-market approach is now the dominant
method of analyzing exchange rate movements in the literature, and it has major advantages over
the more conventional treatment of the foreign exchange market typically found in money and
banking textbooks.
As the second application in the chapter indicates, the asset-market approach, in contrast to
earlier approaches emphasizing import and export demand, can be used to explain a feature of
the foreign exchange market that has received much attention in the press in recent years: the
high volatility of exchange rates. This phenomenon is not well explained by the earlier flow
approach because it does not predict that exchange rates should be highly volatile.
To help students achieve an intuitive grasp of how the relative expected return on domestic
assets, and hence the demand curve shifts, tell them to put themselves in the shoes of an investor
who is thinking about putting his or her money into foreign or domestic assets. When a factor
changes, have them ask themselves whether at the same exchange rate they would earn a higher
expected return on domestic assets—if so, the demand curve has shifted to the right. This kind of
thinking will help them manipulate the demand curve so they can predict which way the
exchange rate changes. Several summary tables in the chapter should help students master the
material, and I have found that using them in class helps greatly in clarifying the discussion.
The four applications in the chapter on the Economist’s Big Mac Index and PPP, on the response
of exchange rates to changes in interest rates, the effect of global financial crisis on the dollar,
and the impact of Britain’s exit (Brexit) and the subsequent collapse of the pound, can all be used
in class to show students that the material they have learned has practical uses.