Ideas for Developing Asia and the Pacific

John Beirne, Vice-Chair of Research and Senior Research Fellow

John Beirne

John Beirne

John Beirne was appointed Vice-Chair of Research and Senior Research Fellow at the Asian Development Bank Institute (ADBI) in April 2022.

He joined ADBI as a Research Fellow in March 2019. He has over 20 years of experience as an economist in the public and private sectors. In his current role, he co-heads ADBI’s Research Department, leading research workstreams on macroeconomics, finance, and infrastructure. He is also co-managing editor of the ADBI Working Paper Series. He concurrently holds the position of Senior Economist at the European Central Bank (ECB), on leave since March 2019. Having spent over a decade at the ECB, his work focused mainly on international policy analysis and economic research on global financial markets, capital flows, and commodities. He also worked for around six years as an economic consultant with KPMG and senior economist with DTZ in Ireland and the United Kingdom (UK), and for three years as a part-time lecturer in economics at Brunel University in the UK.

His research focuses on international macroeconomics, financial economics, and applied econometrics. He has published numerous articles in peer-reviewed journals in economics and finance, co-authored or coedited several ADBI books, and serves as an editorial board member of the Asian Development Review and Asian Economics Letters. He presents his research regularly at international conferences and lectures at the University of Tokyo and Hitotsubashi University in Japan on topics related to financial globalization, monetary policy, and macro-financial risk. He is also a frequent commentator in the media on global macro issues, having interviewed with outlets such as Al Jazeera, Arirang, BBC, Bloomberg, China Daily, The Japan Times, The Straits Times, and RTHK. He holds a PhD in Economics from Brunel University.

Central Bank Asset Purchase Programs in Emerging Market Economies

With E. Sugandi. Finance Research Letters, Vol. 54, no. 103769, 2023.

Nonbank Finance and Monetary Policy Transmission in Asia

With N. Renzhi and U. Volz. Emerging Markets Finance and Trade, Vol. 59(6), pp. 1976-1991, 2023.

When the United States and the People’s Republic of China Sneeze: Monetary Policy Spillovers to Asian Economies

With N. Renzhi and U. Volz. Open Economies Review, 2023.

What Matters for Private Investment in Renewable Energy?

With D. Azhgaliyeva and R. Mishra. Climate Policy, Vol. 23(1), pp. 71-87, 2023.

Local Currency Bond Markets, Foreign Investor Participation, and Capital Flow Volatility in Emerging Asia

With N. Renzhi and U. Volz. Singapore Economic Review, 2021.

COVID-19, Asset Markets and Capital Flows

With N. Renzhi, E. Sugandi and U. Volz. Pacific Economic Review, Vol. 26(4), pp. 498-538, 2021.

Feeling the Heat: Climate Risks and the Cost of Sovereign Borrowing

With N. Renzhi and U. Volz. International Review of Economics and Finance, Vol. 76, pp. 920-936, 2021.

Persistent Current Account Imbalances: Are they Good or Bad for Regional and Global Growth?

With N. Renzhi and U. Volz. Journal of International Money and Finance, Vol. 115(C), no. 102389, 2021.

Bracing for the Typhoon: Climate Change and Sovereign Risk in Southeast Asia

With N. Renzhi and U. Volz. Sustainable Development, Vol. 29(3), pp. 537-551, 2021.

Financial Cycles in Asset Markets and Regions

Economic Modelling, Vol. 92, pp. 358-374, 2020.

Volatility Spillovers of Unconventional Monetary Policy to Emerging Market Economies.

With A. Apostolou. Economic Modelling, Vol. 79(C), pp. 118-129, 2019.

Macroprudential Policies, Capital Flows, and the Structure of the Banking Sector.

With C. Friedrich. Journal of International Money and Finance, Vol. 75, pp. 47-68, 2017.

The Performance Impact of Firm Ownership Transformation in China: Mixed Ownership vs. Fully Privatised Ownership.

With G.S. Liu and S. Pen. Journal of Chinese Economic and Business Studies, Vol. 13(3), pp. 197-216, 2015.

Interdependence and Contagion in Global Asset Markets.

With J. Gieck. Review of International Economics, Vol. 22(4), pp. 639-659, 2014.

The Pricing of Sovereign Risk and Contagion During the European Sovereign Debt Crisis

With M. Fratzscher. Journal of International Money and Finance, Vol. 34(C), pp. 60-82, 2013.

Liquidity Risk, Credit Risk and the Overnight Interest Rate Spread: A Stochastic Volatility Modelling Approach.

With G.M. Caporale, and N. Spagnolo. The Manchester School, Vol. 81(6), pp. 925-940, 2013.

Volatility Spillovers and Contagion from Mature to Emerging Stock Markets.

With G.M. Caporale, M. Schulze-Ghattas and N. Spagnolo. Review of International Economics, Vol. 21(5), pp. 1060-1075, 2013.

Global Oil Prices and the Impact of China

With C. Beulen, G. Liu, and A. Mirzaei. China Economic Review, Vol. 27(C), pp. 37-51, 2013.

Labour Supply and Pollution in China

With J. Yang, G. Liu, and P. Sheng. Applied Economics Letters, Vol. 20(10), pp. 949-952, July, 2013.

Market Structure and Bank Profitability: Emerging Versus Advanced Economies.

With G. Liu, and A. Mirzaei. Economics Bulletin, Vol. 32(4), pp. 3166-3173, 2012.

The Long-Run Convergence of Exchange Rates and Prices in the European Union.

International Review of Applied Economics, Vol. 26(3), pp. 367-385, 2012.

The EONIA Spread Before and During the Crisis of 2007 to 2009 – the Role of Liquidity and Credit Risk.

Journal of International Money and Finance, Vol. 31, pp. 534-551, 2012.

Electricity Prices in China and the Role of the State

With G. Liu, and L. Zhang. Economics Bulletin, Vol. 32(1), pp. 466-474, 2012.

Exchange Rate Pass-Through in the Central and Eastern European EU Member States

With M. Bijsterbosch. Journal of Policy Modeling, Vol. 33(2), pp. 241-254, 2011.

Testing for Global and Regional Spillovers in Emerging Stock Markets

With G.M. Caporale, M. Schulze-Ghattas, and N. Spagnolo. Fiducie, Vol. 18(1), pp. 16-19, 2010.

Global and Regional Spillovers in Emerging Stock Markets – A Multivariate Garch-in-Mean Analysis.

With G.M. Caporale, M. Schulze-Ghattas, and N. Spagnolo. Emerging Markets Review 11(3), pp. 250-260, 2010.

Vulnerability of Inflation in the New EU Member States to Country-Specific and Global Factors.

Economics Bulletin, Vol. 29(2), pp. 1421-1432, 2009.

Market, Interest Rate and Exchange Rate Risk Effects on Financial Stock Returns: A GARCH-M Approach.

With G.M. Caporale, and N. Spagnolo.Quantitative and Qualitative Analysis in Social Sciences, Vol. 3(2), pp. 44-68 (Special Issue on Empirical Finance), 2009.

Limitation of Panel Cointegration: Application to PPP in the EU.

International Advances in Economic Research, Vol. 15(2), pp. 261-262, 2009.

Real Exchange Rate Dynamics and Monetary Integration in Crisis-Affected Regions

Journal of International and Global Economic Studies, Vol. 1(2), pp. 1-25, 2008.

The Equity Premium and Inflation.

With G. de Bondt. Applied Financial Economics Letters, Vol. 4(6), pp. 439-442, 2008.

Is the Real Exchange Rate Stationary? – The Application of Similar Tests for a Unit Root in the Univariate and Panel Cases.

With J. Hunter and M. Simpson. Quantitative and Qualitative Analysis in Social Sciences, Vol. 1(2), pp. 55-70, 2007.

Educational Inputs and Outcomes Before the Transition from Communism.

With N. Campos. The Economics of Transition, Vol. 15(1), pp. 57-76, 2007.

ChatGPT has the potential to lay the foundation for structural change and economywide productivity growth.

With P. Panthi, Asia Bond Monitor March 2023, Box 4, pp.12-14, Manila: Asian Development Bank.

Market power has been a long-standing concern for many policy makers and academic researchers as it greatly matters for economic welfare and resource allocation.

A tightening United States monetary policy cycle in 2022 in the face of severe inflationary pressures has led to a broad-based appreciation of the US dollar.

25 November 2022 Institutional Quality as a Shock Absorber for Asian Capital Flows in Crisis Times - Asia Bond Monitor November 2022, Box 2

High levels of institutional quality help to enhance the resilience of capital flows and economic output to financial shocks.

Fintech has been instrumental in helping to sustain businesses and households during the COVID-19 pandemic, with scope to be an integral driver of sustainable economic development in the post-pandemic era.

Asia has made substantial progress on economic development over the past 3 decades, with the quality of institutions playing an important role.

Quantitative easing measures in Southeast Asia helped to alleviate pressure on long-term bond yields and support stability in asset markets.

The yen’s safe-haven status has been called into question after sharp depreciations amid rising energy prices and widening global interest rate differentials relative to Japan.

25 March 2022 Foreign Participation in Asian Local Currency Bond Markets and Financial Stability Risks - Asia Bond Monitor March 2022, Box 1

Local currency bond markets in Asia have helped to mitigate risks of currency and maturity mismatches, but the increasing presence of foreign investors can lead to capital flow reversal risks in crisis times.

Digitalization is helping to transform economies by enhancing economy-wide competitiveness and productivity, with trade being an important channel.

The economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in Asia highlights the importance of entrenching longer-term sustainability and economic resilience into the recovery process.

With an improved growth outlook in the United States (US) in the second half of 2021 as the economy recovers from the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in part related to the substantial fiscal stimulus in the US introduced at the start of 2021, the Federal Reserve (Fed) is on course to slow down its asset purchases program, or so-called quantitative easing (QE) tapering. This has sparked fears of sharp capital outflows from emerging market economies (EMEs) and currency depreciations, as occurred during the “taper tantrum” episode of May 2013.

Local currency bond markets (LCBMs) have continued to develop in emerging Asian economies since the early 2000s, with foreign investor participation rising markedly since the global financial crisis of 2007–2008.

The mobilization of climate finance is critical for limiting global warming to within 1.5°C and preventing catastrophic climate change (IPCC 2018). Annual green investments totaling $1.5 trillion are needed (United Nations 2017).

Current account surpluses have persisted in a number of Asian and European economies throughout the global financial crisis and thereafter.

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has been a truly global shock to public health, causing one of the most severe global economic downturns since the Great Depression of the 1930s.

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic and the resulting lockdowns have led to an unprecedented economic contraction and turbulence in financial markets, which initially caused the largest ever outflows of portfolio capital from emerging market economies (EMEs).

Climate change can have a material impact on sovereign risk through direct and indirect effects on public finances. In addition, climate change raises the cost of capital in climate vulnerable countries and threatens debt sustainability.

A feature of the academic literature on financial cycles relates to the fact that it almost exclusively focuses on selected advanced economies, the findings of which may not necessarily hold for emerging economies. Global capital flow developments and monetary policies in advanced economies mean that financial cycle dynamics may differ substantially in emerging economies, not only in terms of turning points but also with regard to which asset market cycle best characterizes the financial cycle.

The rise of the digital age has created challenges for policy makers around the globe in managing their economies. Early work on this issue by Cecchetti (2002) noted that macroeconomic management becomes more complex in an environment of digitalization given shifting trend productivity and difficulties in estimating potential output.

The Pricing of Sovereign Risk and Contagion During the European Sovereign Debt Crisis

With M. Fratzscher. In edited volume The Economics of Sovereign Debt, R.W. Kolb (ed.), John Wiley & Son, pp. 60-82, 2016.

Financial Spillovers and Contagion from Mature to Emerging Stock Markets

With G.M. Caporale, M. Schulze-Ghattas and N. Spagnolo. In edited volume Financial Contagion: The Viral Threat to the Wealth of Nations, R.W. Kolb (ed.), John Wiley & Son, pp. 163-169, 2011.

In this podcast, ADBI’s Dina Azhgaliyeva and John Beirne, and Ranjeeta Mishra from the Reserve Bank of India explain the effect of government renewable energy policies on private investment, drawing upon developments in Asia and the Pacific.

In this podcast, ADBI Dean Tetsushi Sonobe, Co-Chair of the T7 Task Force on Sustainable Economic Recovery, and ADBI’s John Beirne and Dina Azhgaliyeva discuss the role and future of the T7.

In this podcast, ADBI Research Fellow John Beirne explains how improvements in infrastructure, digital literacy, and regulation can maximize digitalization’s benefits for the economies in Asia and the Pacific.

In this podcast, ADBI Research Fellow John Beirne addresses these fundamental questions, describing new research that underscores the importance of building longer-term resilience and sustainability in Asia and possible ways forward.

In this podcast, ADBI Research Fellow John Beirne discusses some of the key insights from a joint ADBI-ADB-Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance event on the implications of COVID-19 for fintech, with a focus on developments in Asia and the Pacific.

In this podcast, ADBI research fellow, John Beirne, discusses the ways in which climate risks affect the cost of sovereign borrowing and the sustainability of public finances, with a focus on Southeast Asia which is highly threatened by climate change.

In this podcast, ADBI research fellow, John Beirne, discusses the increasing prominence of the digital economy and digital finance and how continued digitalization will affect policies aimed at managing Asia and the Pacific’s emerging market economies.

Beirne, J., A. H. Khan, A. Surry, P. P. Mitra, and P. Panthi. 2023. T7 Policy Brief, Task Force 1: Development and Economic Prosperity.

Latif, A. A., D. Khanna, D. Rahut, and J. Beirne. 2023. T7 Policy Brief, Task Force 1: Development and Economic Prosperity.

September 2022 Digital Payments and Cross-Border Capital Flows: Policy Actions to Safeguard Macrofinancial Stability

Beirne, J., and T. Riefky. 2022. T20 Policy Brief, Task Force 7: International Finance and Economic Recovery.

Subacchi, P., D. Vines, J. Beirne, A. Filardo, M. L. Fung, A. Garcia Herrero, S. Romano, M. Toksoz, and P. van den Noord. 2022. T7 Policy Brief, Task Force: Sustainable Economic Recovery.

Beirne, J., N. Bilotta , M. L. Fung, and T. Singh. 2022. T7 Policy Brief, Task Force: Sustainable Economic Recovery.

Beirne, J., N. Renzhi, and U. Volz. 2021. T20 Policy Brief, Task Force 9: International Finance.

21 May 2023 The Straits Times
21 May 2023 Handelsblatt

G7 läuten neue China-Politik ein (article in German: “G7 heralds new China policy”)

19 May 2023 BBC (TV)

Economic coercion amid an uncertain global economic outlook

18 May 2023 CNBC (TV)
11 May 2023 The Straits Times
10 May 2023 Peter Lewis’ Money Talk
25 April 2023 Radio Television Hong Kong
12 April 2023 Peter Lewis’ Money Talk
28 March 2023 Radio Television Hong Kong
16 March 2023 The Japan Times
7 March 2023 Radio Television Hong Kong
21 February 2023 Radio Television Hong Kong
31 January 2023 Radio Television Hong Kong
31 January 2023 Arirang News (TV)
17 January 2023 China Daily
17 January 2023 China Daily
13 January 2023 Japan Times
10 January 2023 Radio Television Hong Kong
19 December 2022 China Daily
13 December 2022 Radio Television Hong Kong
8 December 2022 Business Mirror
6 December 2022 China Daily
5 December 2022 Japan Times
1 November 2022 Radio Television Hong Kong
18 October 2022 Radio Television Hong Kong
4 October 2022 BBC (TV)

Asia Business Report: Yen Pressure and FX Intervention

27 September 2022 Radio Television Hong Kong
30 August 2022 Radio Television Hong Kong
12 August 2022 China Daily
5 August 2022 China Daily
2 August 2022 Radio Television Hong Kong
29 July 2022 China Daily
28 June 2022 Arirang News (TV)
28 June 2022 Radio Television Hong Kong
7 June 2022 Radio Television Hong Kong
28 May 2022 China Daily
20 May 2022 China Daily
11 May 2022 Al Jazeera
13 April 2022 Bloomberg News
7 April 2022 Arirang News (TV)
2 November 2021 Philippine Star
15 July 2021 Business World