Department of Economics

The exchange rate literature contains two inconsistent strands. There is a large theoretical and empirical literature on overshooting. In that literature overshooting is an important explanation for exchange rate volatility. A separate literature says that exchange rates are martingales and that models do not beat a random walk. Both can not be true. I show that the evidence for overshooting is highly suspect while the evidence that flexible exchange rates are approximately martingales is rock solid. Given the strength of the evidence, models that imply overshooting probably should be rejected out of hand.