F30 - International Finance: GeneralReturn

The article focuses on the relationship between the general government balance and the current account of the balance of payments. The aim is to summarize the existing knowledge about the relationship based on the twin deficit theory and to carry out an empirical verification. As part of the analysis, the Granger causality method is first applied to each EU country separately, and then the threshold panel regression method is used. For the subsequent estimation of the threshold panel model, the direction of the relationship from the general government balance to the current account is considered based on the results of Granger causality. Within the panel, the dependence of the balances on the level of the general government debt to GDP is tested. First, the relationship and its strength are verified in all EU countries. Due to the diversity of EU countries, the economies are subsequently aggregated into sub-panels. Threshold values for general government debt affecting the strength of the relationship between balances are different for individual panels and depend, among other things, on the perception of these countries by the financial markets and often also on the (high) indebtedness of the private sector, which usually requires a more drastic fiscal policy response.

The study is focused on macroeconomic stability of the Czech economy. The first part (methodological) stems from the system of national accounting which offers two approaches: from the point of view of relationship between domestic supply and demand and between savings and investments. Analytical part examines domestic supply and demand, which is reflected in the balance of foreign trade. There was a positive tendency due to a favourable development in foreign trade. The relation between savings and investments, which is equal to current account balance, looks less favourable. The main source of imbalance is a negative balance of incomes expressing bigger outflow of primary incomes in relation to their inflow. Public finances can be identified as the weakest chain link of economic development. International comparison with new EU Members from middle Europe indicates that keeping macroeconomic stability in acceptable boundaries represents a serious problem.

The article analyses a development of the external balance in five Central and Eastern European countries: the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, the Slovak Republic, and Slovenia. The main idea of the article is to apply, expand, and empirically verify the ideas of life cycle theory in the area of the impacts of foreign direct investment on the balance of payments in the transition countries. The article defines and explores the basic general stages in the external balance of a transition country. The definition of the stages draws from a model consumer behaviour within the life cycle theory once the external balance stages have been defined as follows: young transition economy, mature transition economy, post-transition economy, and expanding economy. The authors have developed a model that provides criteria which not only classify the current stage of each transition country, but also evaluate the success in the catching-up process of the country examined.