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In principle, physical currency should be disappearing: payments are increasingly electronic, with new technologies emerging rapidly, and governments increasingly restrict large-denomination notes as a way to reduce crime and tax evasion. Nonetheless, demand for U.S. banknotes continues to grow, and consistently increases at times of crisis both within and outside the United States because dollar banknotes remain a desirable store of value and medium of exchange when local currency or bank deposits are inferior. Most recently, the COVID crisis resulted in historic increases in currency demand. After allowing for the effect of crises, U.S. banknote demand appears to be driven by the usual factors determining money demand, with no discernible downward trend. In this work, I review developments in demand for U.S. currency over the past few decades with a focus on developments since early 2020. In addition, I revisit the question of international demand: I present the raw data available for measuring international banknote flows and updates on indirect methods of estimating the stock of currency held abroad. These methods continue to indicate that a large share of U.S. currency is held abroad, especially in the $100 denomination. As shown earlier (Judson 2012, 2017), once a country or region begins using dollars, subsequent crises result in additional inflows: the dominant sources of international demand over recent decades are the countries and regions that were already heavy dollar users in the early to mid-1990s. While international demand for U.S. currency eased during the early 2000s as financial conditions improved, the abrupt return to strong international demand that began with the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008 has not slowed and reached new heights over 2020 and 2021. In contrast, however, the growth rate of demand for smaller denominations is slowing, perhaps indicating the first signs of declining domestic cash demand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using confidential Federal Reserve data, we study the factors driving U.S. banknote flows between the United States and other countries. These flows are a significant component of capital flows in emerging market economies, where physical U.S. currency functions as a safe asset and precautionary demand for U.S. banknotes is a form of flight to quality. Prior to the global financial crisis, country-specific factors, including local economic uncertainty, largely explain the volume and heterogeneity of the flows. Since the crisis, global factors, particularly, global economic uncertainty, explain the flows markedly well. Further, precautionary demand for U.S. banknotes is not episodic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The role of capital flows in the buildup to the global financial crisis and the potential vulnerabilities posed by capital flows to emerging market economies highlight the importance of reliable and timely measures of cross-border investment activity to better monitor developments as they unfold. We present new monthly estimates of U.S. cross-border securities investment, combining information from detailed annual Treasury International Capital (TIC) surveys with new information from the TIC form SLT. We also show how changes in the new monthly data can be decomposed into flows, estimated valuation changes, and a residual "gap". These decompositions can provide a richer and timelier view of developments in both foreign portfolio investment in the U.S. and U.S. portfolio investment abroad than available from transactions data or survey data alone. Data on cross-border holdings through December 2013, by country, are available for download; we also provide advice on how to construct estimates going forward. These data can be combined with the existing Bertaut-Tryon monthly estimates of securities holdings (now updated through 2011) to generate consistent monthly time series of positions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

U.S. currency has long been a desirable store of value and medium of exchange in times and places where local currency or bank deposits are inferior in one or more respects. Indeed, as noted in earlier work, a substantial share of U.S. currency circulates outside the United States. Although precise measurements of stocks and flows of U.S. currency outside the United States are not available, a variety of data sources and methods have been developed to provide estimates. This paper reviews the raw data available for measuring international banknote flows and presents updates on indirect methods of estimating the stock of currency held abroad: the seasonal method and the biometric method. These methods require some adjustments, but they continue to indicate that a large share of U.S. currency is held abroad, especially in the $100 denomination. In addition to these existing indirect methods, I develop a framework and basic variants of a new method to estimate the share of U.S. currency held abroad. Although the methods and estimates are disparate, they provide support for several hypotheses regarding cross-border dollar stocks and flows. First, once a country or region begins using dollars, subsequent crises result in additional inflows: the dominant sources of international demand over the past decade and a half are the countries and regions that were known to be heavy dollar users in the early to mid-1990s. Second, economic stabilization and modernization appear to result in reversal of these inflows. Specifically, demand for U.S. currency was extremely strong through the 1990s, a period of turmoil for the former Soviet Union and for Argentina, two of the largest overseas users of U.S. currency. Demand eased in the early 2000s as conditions gradually stabilized and as financial institutions developed. However, this trend reversed sharply with the onset of the financial crisis in late 2008 and has continued since then. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous research indicated that the daily liquidity effect, or the change in the federal funds rate associated with an exogenous change in Fed balances, varies with several factors including the day of the maintenance period. In this paper, we examine the data over the recent period of increased Federal Reserve transparency and find that the liquidity effect stabilized across days of the maintenance period. Rather, the liquidity effect may be a function of the uncertainty about banks' end-of-day balances. Moreover, we find that increased transparency led to a larger liquidity effect on the days prior to an FOMC meeting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides new estimates of banks' demand for excess reserve balances on a period average basis. Consistent with theoretical work, we find that the demand for excess depends critically on uncertainty of flows in and out of reserve accounts. We also document the variability of demand for excess reserve balances by institution size, evaluate different models for forecasting demand for excess on a period average basis, and report the forecasting performance of each of these models. Finally, we present analysis of the period of financial turmoil seen over the year since August, 2007. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines competition and information sharing in the automobile industry. The authors investigate a panel data set during 1965-1995 and match the production forecasts with data for actual monthly production. They illustrate that an organization's plan announcement has an effect on competitors' later revisions of their own plans and eventual production. The authors suggest that the interaction seems to be complementary. Large plans or upward revisions cause competitors to revise plans upward and boost production. Results appear to be consistent with models in which an organization shares information regarding common demand parameters. This working paper is available at the US Federal Reserve Board. You can access this site by going to www.federalreserve.gov/pubs/workingpapers.htm.

Prior studies on dynamic panel estimation have concentrated on small time dimensions and large individual dimensions. This paper uses the Monte Carlo approach to examine the performance of different approaches designed to decrease the bias of the estimated coefficients for the longer, narrower panels generally found for macro data. The authors find there is considerable bias of the least squares dummy variable approach even when the time dimension of the panel is as large as 30. For panels with small time dimensions, they find a corrected least squares dummy variable estimator to be the best choice. The authors also find that the Anderson-Hsiao estimator performs just as well. The authors apply their recommendations to a panel of countries to show that increases in income growth appear before increases in savings rates and increases in savings rates appear before income growth. This working paper is available at the US Federal Reserve Board. You can access this site by going to www.federalreserve.gov/pubs/workingpapers.htm.

The authors of this paper investigates the correlation between inflation, inflation volatility and growth. They use thirty years of cross-country panel data and apply the time dimension of the data and find a strong negative correlation between income growth and inflation for all except very low inflation countries. They use intra-year inflation data to examine the role of inflation uncertainty on growth and find that inflation volatility is also negatively correlated with growth even with the effect of a controlled level of inflation. This working paper is available at the US Federal Reserve Board. You can access this site by going to www.federalreserve.gov/pubs/workingpapers.htm.

This paper develops a new measure of human capital stock that has two advantages over previous measures: 1) it allows for the fact that the cost of education varies across time, countries, and levels, and 2) the unit of measurement is dollars, which allows comparison of human capital stocks with other macroeconomic variables, including national income (GDP) and physical capital stocks. The author uses cross-country panel regression analysis and suggests that human capital accumulation accounts for a small percent of per-capita GDP growth. She also suggests that human capital stock as a share of GDP increases with GDP. This working paper is available at the US Federal Reserve Board. You can access this site by going to www.federalreserve.gov/pubs/workingpapers.htm.