Spillovers of the United States’ Unconventional Monetary Policy to Emerging Asia: The Bank Lending Channel

Abstract

This article assesses the spillover effects of the United States’ unconventional monetary policy (i.e., quantitative easing programs adopted during 2008–2014) on the Asian credit market. Focusing on cross-border bank lending, we employed firm-level loan data with regard to the syndicated loan market and measured the international bank lending channel through changes in the United States dollar-denominated loans extended to Asian borrowers. We found that the growth of dollar credit in Asia increased substantially in response to the quantitative easing in the US financial market. The results of this study confirm the existence of the bank lending channel in Asia and emphasize the role of credit flows in transmitting financial conditions. The article also provides new evidence of cross-border liquidity spillover in the syndicated loan market. We found that the overall spillover effect was large but differed significantly in Asia by types of borrowing firms, financing purposes, and loan terms at different stages of the quantitative easing programs.