歐元之國際貨幣地位探討-以全球外匯準備組成分析

Abstract

本文為探討國際貨幣的地位，從貨幣的使用功能開始分析，整理出多項影響國際貨幣流通的因素，而民間和官方對於國際貨幣的持有目的不同，但其中卻存在一定的關聯程度，當官方執行貨幣政策時，以所持有的國際貨幣在市場間進行買賣，用以達成匯率目標，亦可干預外匯市場，此動作造成的波動即可能影響民間在進出口報價貨幣的選擇，以及外匯資產的配置。 一般文獻中用以衡量國際貨幣地位的指標眾多，本文選擇以各國官方所持有的外匯準備作為判斷依據，因為此變數擁有相對完整且長時間的統計資料，亦被視為判斷歐元是否可能超越美元地位的衡量指標(Chinn and Frankel 2007)，另外，解釋變數的選擇如國家的經濟規模、匯率、通貨膨脹率、外匯市場交易量等，再結合近日重要的債務議題，將政府赤字及債務比率加入探討，以panel data形式分析後，再進一步做出可能的情境假設，模擬未來的外匯準備趨勢。 總結各情境模擬，歐元僅有在歐洲五國順利達成赤字減少目標，並配合歐元匯率提升時，才有可能在外匯準備貨幣地位上逐漸追上美元，證實穩定的金融和貨幣價值增加為貨幣國際化之關鍵因素，兩者相輔相成下，才會增加各國官方對歐元貨幣持有的吸引力。如延續近年匯率走勢，美元相對歐元升值，加上歐洲五國政府赤字無法順利減少的情況下，兩貨幣地位將形成強大差距，歐元在國際貨幣的地位會逐漸下降，美元則穩固其國際主要貨幣角色。

The Eurozone is an economic union consisting of 17 member states. The population using the Euro has reached over 330 billion since its introduction as the official currency of the 17 participating nations in 2002. The single currency not only reduces the cost of money exchange between member states, but has also revived the European economy. Within just a decade, the Euro has managed to become the world’s second most important international currency, after the U.S. dollar. This research surveys the international role of the Euro; we start by discussing the functions of the currency, and then conclude with the factors that could affect international foreign exchange reserves choices. We use official foreign exchange reserves as a reference, due to the relatively complete and long-term statistical data available for these assets. We can estimate the probability of the Euro becoming the leading reserve currency (Chinn and Frankel 2007). Furthermore, through choosing independent variables such as economic performance, foreign exchange rate, inflation rate, foreign exchange trade volume etc., and combining this data with current events such as government deficits, we can simulate possible scenarios and predict future foreign exchange reserves trends.