IMF Working Papers

This paper studies the impact effect of monetary policy shocks—identified by the reaction of three month market interest rates to policy announcements—on the exchange rate in Australia, Canada, and New Zealand during the 1990s. The main results are that (1) on average, a 100 basis point contractionary shock will appreciate the exchange rate by 2-3 percent on impact; (ii) seemingly “perverse” reactions of the exchange rate to monetary policy are mainly attributable to reverse causality; (iii) in a few instances, there were true “perverse” reactions of exchange rates to policy— generally, appreciations following expansionary shocks.