Exchange Market Pressure, Monetary Policy, and Economic Growth: Argentina in 1993 - 2004

The pressure in the exchange market against a particular currency has been frequently measured as the sum of the loss of international reserves plus the loss of nominal value of that currency. This paper follows the tradition of investigating the interactions between such measure of exchange market pressure (EMP) and monetary policy; but it also questions the usual omission of output growth in the empirical investigations of the interrelations between EMP, domestic credit, and interest rates. The focus of this work is Argentina between 1993 and 2004. As in previous studies, we found some evidence of a positive and double-direction relationship between EMP and domestic credit. But output growth also played a role in the determination of EMP, even more than domestic credit or interest rates. Also, there is some evidence that EMP affected growth negatively.