The microstructure of foreign exchange markets
By: edited by Jeffrey A. Frankel, Giampaolo Galli, and Alberto Giovannini.
Contributors: Frankel, Jeffrey A.; Galli, Giampaolo.; Giovannini, Alberto.
Series: A National Bureau of Economic Research conference report; Conference report (National Bureau of Economic Research)
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Published: 1996
Place of publication: Chicago, Ill
Language: eng
Number of pages: 346
Subjects: Foreign exchange -- Congresses.
Description: The foreign exchange market is the largest, fastest-growing financial market in the world, featuring approximately $1.3 trillion worth of transactions everyday. Yet conventional macroeconomic approaches do not even attempt to explain why people trade foreign exchange. At the same time, they fail at the task that they do set for themselves, accounting for the short-run determinants of the exchange rate.

These nine innovative essays use a microstructure approach to analyze the working of the foreign exchange market, with special emphasis on institutional aspects and the actual behavior of market participants. They examine the volume of transactions, heterogeneity of traders, the time of day and location of trading, the bid-ask spread, and high level of exchange rate volatility that has puzzled many observers.

They also consider the structure of the market, including such issues as nontransparency, asymmetric information, liquidity trading, the use of automated brokers, the relationship between spot and derivative markets, and the importance of systematic risk in the market. This timely volume will be essential reading for anyone interested in international finance.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and indexes.
Papers from a conference sponsored by the Bank of Italy, the National Bureau of Economic Research of Cambridge, USA, and the Centre for Economic Policy Research of London, UK, was held at S.A.DI.BA., the Banca d'Italia's conference center in Perugia, Italy, on July 1-2, 1994.