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Homeownership provides shelter and is a vital component of wealth, and house purchase signifies a lifetime achievement for many households. For South Africa confronted with social and structural challenges, homeownership by the low and lower middle-income household is pivotal for its structural transformation process. In spite of these potential benefits, research on the affordable housing market in the context of South Africa is limited. This study aims to contribute to this knowledge gap by answering the question “do changes in household income per capita have a symmetric or asymmetric effect on affordable house prices?”

A survey of the international literature on house prices and income revealed that linear modelling that assumes symmetric reaction of macroeconomic variables dominates the empirical strategy. This linearity assumption is restrictive and fails to capture possible asymmetric dynamics inherent in the housing market. The authors address this empirical limitation by using asymmetric non-linear autoregressive distributed lag models that can test and detect the existence of asymmetry in both the long and short run using data from 1985Q1 to 2016Q3.

The results revealed the presence of an asymmetric long-run relationship between affordable house prices and household income per capita. The estimated asymmetric long-run coefficients of logIncome[+] and logIncome[−] are 1.080 and −4.354, respectively, implying that a 1% increase/decrease in household income per capita induces a 1.08% rise/4.35% decline in affordable house prices everything being equal. The positive increase in affordable house prices creates wealth, helps low and middle-income household climb the property ladder and can reduce inequality, which provides support for the country’s structural transformation process. Conversely, a decline in affordable house prices tends to reduce wealth and widen inequality.

This paper recommends both supply- and demand-side policies to support affordable housing development. Supply-side stimulants should include incentives to attract developers to affordable markets such as municipal serviced land and tax credit. Demand-side policy should focus on asset-based welfare policy; for example, the current Finance Linked Income Subsidy Programme (FLISP). Efficient management and coordination of the FLISP are essential to enhance the affordability of first-time buyers. Given the enormous size of the affordable property market, the practice of mortgage securitization by financial institutions should be monitored, as a persistent decline in income can trigger a systemic risk to the economy.

The study results illustrate the importance of homeownership by low- and middle-income households and that the development of the affordable market segment can boost wealth creation and reduce residential segregation. This, in turn, provides support to the country’s structural transformation process.

The affordable housing market in South Africa is of strategic importance to the economy, accounting for 71.4% of all residential properties. Homeownership by low and lower middle-income households creates wealth, reduces wealth inequality and improves revenue collection for local governments. This paper contributes to the empirical literature by modelling the asymmetric behaviour of affordable house prices to changes in household income per capita and other macroeconomic fundamentals. Based on available evidence, this is the first attempt to examine the dynamic asymmetry between affordable house prices and household income per capita in South Africa.

The Polish economy has undergone major challenges and changes over the past few decades. The country's trade flows, in particular, have become more firmly tied to the country’s Western neighbors as they have grown in volume. This study examines Poland's trade balances in ten Standard International Trade Classification (SITC) sectors versus the United States of America, first testing for and isolating structural breaks in each time series. These breaks are then included in a set of the cointegration models to examine their macroeconomic determinants.

Linear and nonlinear and nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag models, both with and without dummies corresponding to structural breaks, are estimated.

One key finding is that incorporating these breaks reduces the significance of the real exchange rate in the model, supporting the hypothesis that this variable already incorporates important information. It also results in weaker evidence for cointegration of all variables in certain sectors.

This study looks only at one pair of countries, without any third-country effects.

An important country pair's trade relations is examined; in addition, the real exchange rate is shown to incorporate economic information that results in structural changes in the economy. The paper extends the existing literature by conducting an analysis of Poland's trade balances with the USA, which have not been studied in such a context so far. A strong point is a broad methodology that lets compare the results the authors obtained with different kinds of models, both linear and nonlinear ones, with and without structural breaks.

Might the impact of the global economic policy uncertainty (GEPU) and the long-term bond yields on oil prices be asymmetric? This paper aims to consider the effects of the GEPU and the US long-term government bond yields on oil prices using quantile-based analysis and nonlinear vector autoregression (VAR) model. The author hypothesized whether the negative and positive changes in the GEPU and the long-term bond yields of the USA have different effects on oil prices.

To address this question, the author uses quantile cointegration model and the impulse response functions (IRFs) of the censored variable approach of Kilian and Vigfusson (2011).

The quantile cointegration test showed the existence of non-linear cointegration relationship, whereas Granger-causality analysis revealed that positive/negative variations in GEPU will have opposite effects on oil prices. This result was supported by the quantile regression model’s coefficients and nonlinear VAR model’s IRFs; more specifically, it was stressed that increasing/decreasing GEPU will deaccelerate/accelerate global economic activity and thus lead to a fall/rise in oil prices. On the other hand, the empirical models indicated that the impact of US 10-year government bond yields on oil prices is asymmetrical, while it was found that deterioration in the borrowing conditions in the USA may have an impact on oil prices by slowing down the global economic activity.

As a robustness check of the quantile-based analysis results, the slope-based Mork test is used.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the pricing efficiency of the Malaysian crude palm oil (CPO) market before and after the structural break. This study uses the daily closing price of CPO and CPO futures (CPO-F) for the period ranging from June 2009 to August 2016 while taking structural breaks into account.

In this study, symmetric and asymmetric long-run relationship model are employed, such as the Johansen cointegration, VECM, TAR and M-TAR models, to examine the impact of structural breaks on the pricing efficiency of the Malaysian CPO market.

This finding establish that Malaysian CPO price is efficient before and after the structural break. The consistent efficiency of the Malaysian CPO market supports the trading of the CPO-F in Globex and the use of Malaysian CPO pricing as the reference price. This study establishes that a structural break in the Malaysian CPO price series does not affect the pricing efficiency of the market.

This study shows that using Malaysian CPO price as a reference price is sustainable even in the event of a structural break. Therefore, market participants in the Malaysian CPO market have less to worry about the CPO price as it supports the weak form of efficiency. Price deviation in the short run may not lead to arbitrage profit as transaction cost may not be covered.

This study implies that if there is distortion in the price due to shocks, both manufacturers and producers need to hedge their positions in the futures market (subject to their positions in the underlying market). By entering into the futures market, pricing is locked in advance; hence, price risk is eliminated. Such a distortion could also affect the efficiency of the CPO price, therefore this study also addresses the issue of efficiency of the local CPO market.

Previous studies on Malaysian CPO pricing efficiency did not take the effect of structural break into consideration, making it difficult for these studies to show consistency in the efficiency of the Malaysian CPO market.

Among the many factors fueling the inflationary tendencies in an economy such as monetary shocks, structural shocks, demand shocks, external shocks and demographic changes, the issue of inflation (INF) has also been found to be related to fiscal policy decisions of the government. The purpose of this study is to investigate the inflationary tendencies in India particularly from the fiscal point of view. The study also examines the influence of other potential determinants such as output growth rate, interest rate, trade-openness (TO) and oil price inflation (OPI).

To examine the dynamic nature of association between fiscal deficit and inflation, the study applies the Toda-Yamamoto (1995) test and Breitung and Candelon (2006) test to investigate the nature of causality in time and frequency domain frameworks. In addition, to scrutinize the possibility of a long-run association, that too from an asymmetric point of view, the study applies a Non-linear Autoregressive Distributed lag model (NARDL) given by Shin et al. (2014). Finally, non-linear cumulative dynamic multipliers are used to trace the traverse between disequilibrium position of short-run and subsequent long-run equilibrium of the system.

The authors found a unidirectional causality from fiscal deficit to inflation in case of time domain analysis and no feedback causality is reported. However, in case of frequency domain design, causality from fiscal deficit to inflation is found at low frequencies only, i.e. no short-run causality is established and hence dynamic nature of the relationship between the two variables is vindicated. Using NARDL model, the results document the existence of an asymmetric long-run direct association between fiscal deficit and inflation. However, an increase in deficit is found to be more inflationary and a decrease affects the inflation with a lower magnitude. The asymmetric impact of fiscal deficit on inflation can be explained through the existence of liquidity constraints, consumption-investment downward inflexibility and the downward price stickiness. Contractionary monetary policy action is found to be more effective than an expansionary one, signifying the asymmetric influence of monetary policy actions on the inflation of India. Similarly, in a supply-constrained economy with downward price rigidity, the authors found an asymmetric impact of output growth and output decline on inflation. As regard to the trade-openness, although an asymmetry is reported, the signs refute the validation of Romer (1993) hypothesis. Finally, the impact of oil price inflation on the inflationary pressures is according to theory but the coefficients are devoid of statistical significance.

These results indicate some important policy recommendations. Fiscal consolidation strategy should be executed in an appreciable manner to achieve the sound fiscal health and lower INF. The disciplined fiscal strategy would also be imperative for an effective monetary policy. Monetary authorities should possess noticeable credibility to manage the macroeconomic system and policy stances should be implemented according to requirements of the economy. Growth in output should be encouraged to have two-fold benefits to the economy – reducing INF on the one hand and fiscal deficits on the other.

The study contributes to the existing literature in the following ways. First, taking note of dynamic nature of the relationship between these two variables, the study examined the deficit INF nexus in a dynamic and asymmetric framework. The novelty of the study is ensured by the very nature of it is the first study in case of India to identify the fiscal INF in an asymmetric configuration. The authors applied a NARDL model, given by Shin et al. (2014) to examine the existence of any cointegrating relationship in an asymmetric paradigm. Second, the nature of causality between fiscal deficit and INF has been examined in a time domain and FD framework to portray precisely the casual interactions between these two variables in the short-run and long run. The study will, therefore, enrich the existing literature along the asymmetric lines.

The authors explore the relationship between the exchange rate, bond yield and the stock market as well as the effect of capital market dynamics on the exchange rate before and during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The authors employ a non-linear autoregressive distributed lag (NARDL) methodology using daily data of the Indonesian economy over the period 2012–2021.

Whilst, over the full sample period, the authors find no cointegration between the exchange rate, the 10-year bond yield and stock market, for the COVID-19 period, evidence of cointegration is present. Furthermore, the results suggest that asymmetric effects are evident both in the short as well as the long run.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first time that the relationship between the exchange rate, bond yield and the stock market as well as the effect of capital market dynamics on the exchange rate before and during the COVID-19 pandemic has been explored in the case of the Indonesian economy.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the influence of VND/USD exchange rate on Vietnamese coffee export price (PVN).

The study uses cointegration test, Granger causality test and vector autoregression (VAR) model.

The results reveal that there is no co-integrating equation between two variables. It means the exchange rate does not have an effect on PVN in the long run. Furthermore, there is one Granger causality relationship between VND/USD exchange rate and PVN in the short run, but not vice versa. The study suggests that the first previous period of PVN is the most closely related variable which has the greatest impact on the variation of PVN among the selected variables, meanwhile the effect of VND/USD exchange rate on it, contrarily, is positive and very trivial.

In overall, the impact of VND/USD exchange rate on Vietnamese coffee export price (PVN) has been analyzed deeply in this research by applying new approaches.

This study proposed an optimal model to examine the relationship between the Bitcoin price and six macroeconomic variables – the Bitcoin price, Standard and Poor's 500 volatility index, US treasury 10-year yield, US consumer price index, gold price and dollar index. It also examined the effectiveness of the vector error correction model (VECM) in analyzing the interrelationship among these variables. The authors employed the following approach: first, the authors sampled the period August 2010–February 2022. This is because Bitcoin achieved a market capitalization of more than US$1 tn over this period, gaining market attention and acceptance from retail, corporate and institutional investors. Second, the authors employed a VECM with the six macroeconomic variables. Finally, the authors expanded the long-run equilibrium relationship (time-invariant cointegration)-based VECM to develop a time-varying cointegration (TVC) VECM. The authors estimated the TVC VECM using the Chebyshev polynomial specification based on various information criteria. The results showed that the Bitcoin price can be modeled with the VECM (p = 1, r = 1). The TVC approach generated more explanatory power for Bitcoin pricing, indicating the effectiveness of the approach for modeling the long-run relationship between Bitcoin price and macroeconomic variables.

This study explores the response of consumer confidence in policy uncertainty in the Japanese context. The study also considers the dynamism of stock market behavior and financial stress and its impact on consumer confidence, which has remained unaddressed in the literature. The role of these control variables has important implications for policy discussions, particularly when other countries can learn from Japanese experiences.

The nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag model postulated by Shin et al. (2014) was used for studying the asymmetric response of consumer confidence to policy uncertainty. This method has improved estimates compared to traditional linear cointegration methods.

The findings confirm the asymmetric impact of policy uncertainty on the consumer confidence index in Japan. The impact of the rise in policy uncertainty is greater than that of a fall in asymmetry on consumer confidence in Japan. Furthermore, the Wald test confirmed asymmetric behavior.

The contribution of this study is threefold. First, this study contributes to the extant literature by analyzing the asymmetric response of consumer confidence to policy uncertainty, controlling for both the financial stress and stock price indices. Second, to test the robustness of the exercise, the study utilized different frequencies of observations. Third, this study is the first to utilize the concept of Arbatli et al. (2017) to formulate a combined index of uncertainty based on economic policy uncertainty index, along with uncertainty indices such as fiscal, monetary, trade and exchange rate policies to study the overall impact of policy uncertainty.

This paper aims to analyze the dynamics of the Spanish public debt–gross domestic product ratio during the period 1850–2020.

This study uses a recent procedure to test for recurrent explosive behavior (Phillips et al., 2011; Phillips et al., 2015a, 2015b) to identify episodes of explosive public debt dynamics and also the episodes of fiscal adjustments over this long period.

The identified episodes of explosive behavior of public debt coincided with fiscal stress events, whereas fiscal adjustments and changes in economic policies stabilized public finances after periods of explosive dynamics of public debt.

The longer than usual span of the data should allow the authors to obtain some more robust results than in most of previous analyses of long-run sustainability.