2.1 Asset shortages and bubbles
If we could ignore capital market frictions of all sorts, emerging market
economies would borrow massive amounts from the rest of the world, both
to build the stock of capital required to catch up with developed economies
and to smooth consumption intertemporally. However, this description does
not fit these economies’ reality. Not only is their international borrowing limited, but they also experience chronic capital outflows from residents, ranging
from households to central banks, seeking to store value in safer locations.
In short, emerging market economies are not able to produce the financial
assets demanded by local agents to store value.
The reasons for asset supply shortages in these economies come from a
variety of microeconomic, macroeconomic, and political deficiencies. Weak
bankruptcy procedures, chronic macroeconomic volatility, and sheer expropriation
risk reduce the value and safety of local assets.
However, there is a latent tension between the potentially high marginal
product of physical investment in these economies and the relatively low
returns obtained from safer external assets. This gap creates both a natural
source of speculative bubbles (by which I mean assets held primarily for their
potential capital gains rather than for their dividends) and a potentially
useful role for them. There is a sort of dynamic inefficiency. If domestic
agents succeed in coordinating their investments in some local assets, their
capital repatriation can lead to higher returns to those that choose to store
value in local assets. This path is rational (potentially sustainable) because
of the gap in returns. In turn, these additional resources relax financial
constraints and facilitate domestic growth. Again, it is the gap in returns
that makes this strategy potentially welfare improving.
Real estate, and land in particular, are among the assets with best de-
fined property rights in many of these economies and therefore become the
initial focus of attention. Corporate assets from the bellwether companies of
the country follow behind. Eventually, the large asset appreciations attract
foreign investors who further fuel local speculation.
Not all is virtuous in the bubbly equilibrium, however. There is an inherent
macroeconomic fragility in coordination-dependent speculative booms.
In the same way as these start, investors’ moods can change rapidly, causing
an implosion in local asset values and widespread international liquidity
scarcity as the savings that once were stored in safe heavens are now deployed
in riskier local assets, and there is a surge in capital outflows for those that
can still do it.