Foreign Exchange Rates and International Finance (Second Edition)

Foreign Exchange Rates and International Finance (Second Edition) includes updated information on economic, financial, and global events that have taken place in the past six years. It can be used by international financial market traders and practitioners, global company executives, and policymakers as well as undergraduate and graduate students. This book aims to equip current and future leaders in business, banking, and finance with mathematics, statistics, econometrics and data sources that they need to analyze, measure, and forecast international variables. Readers will learn about the history of the monetary system and different currencies, the balance of payments and the problems of the trade deficits, and policies to improve imbalances. The analysis of foreign exchange markets, exchange rates and their determination as well as models to forecast the exchange rates are covered extensively, together with the efficiency of these markets. International parity conditions and exchange rate expectations provide important relations between countries, useful for traders, arbitragers, and speculators. Foreign currency derivatives and their use to manage (hedge) the exchange rate risk are described with practical applications for business managers. Furthermore, the management of multinational corporations (MNCs), their cost of capital, and capital structure are described and mathematically examined. A multinational capital budget is analyzed with its rules, criteria, and an empirical example from the point of view of the project. The foreign direct investment and the motives of a MNC to go abroad are evaluated together with the domestic and international portfolio theory. Finally, international trade instruments, finance and insurance are examined as well as the political risk that MNCs face by doing business in foreign countries and how to measure and manage this risk.