Non-linear exchange rate pass through in industrial economies

This paper presents theoretical arguments for a non-linear pass-through relationship for import and export prices and investigates the relationship empirically. The theoretical argument is based on the menu-cost approach in which small absolute changes in exchange rates may not prompt price changes because the costs of doing so exceed the extra profits generated for firms involved in international trade. This relationship is investigated empirically using quarterly data for the period 1979q1 to 2015q1 for a sample of seventeen countries. In the case of import prices, evidence is found of non-linear adjustment consistent with the theoretical model in four out of seventeen cases. In the case of export prices, such a relationship is only evident for two economies in the sample. However, for both the import and export price cases, a significant positive non-linear relationship is found for the two largest economies in the sample i.e. the United States and Japan.