Investigating the interaction between terms of trade and domestic economy: In the case of the Korean economy

Purpose – This paper aims to analyze the impact of the terms of trade, export price, and import price on the Korean economy (that is, real GDP, CPI, money market rate, and real effective exchange rate), and vice versa in the simple vector autoregression. Design/methodology – We impose two assumptions, i.e., diagonality and bloc exogeneity, to correctly identify the impact of a factor to the others in the structural equation. With two contemporaneous assumptions in the structural VAR, this paper investigates the impacts of the terms of trade on the Korean economy and vice versa. Findings – Impulse responses to the shocks in the terms of trade and Korean economy show that 1) an impact of the terms of trade on the economy is different in export prices and in import prices. A higher export price is beneficial to the economy while a higher import price hurts the economy, and 2) an increase in real effective exchange rate and in interest rate constrains domestic production and lowers consumer prices. Originality/value – Unlike the conventional perception that a depreciation of a currency would promote exports and domestic production at the price of inflation, our result shows the opposite, and 3) real GDP and consumer prices are positively correlated. That is, an increase in real GDP does not only cause inflation, but an increase in consumer prices also promote domestic production. Yet, the only difference is that export prices and import prices end up higher with an increase in real GDP, but lower with inflation.