Closing international real business cycle models with restricted financial markets

Several authors argue that international real business cycle (IRBC) models with incomplete financial markets offer a good explanation of the ranking of cross-country correlations. This conclusion is suspect, because it is based on an analysis of the near steady state dynamics using a linearized system of equations. The baseline IRBC model with incomplete markets does not possess a unique deterministic steady state and, as a result, its linear system of difference equations is not stationary. We show that the ranking of cross-country correlations is robust to modifications that ensure a unique steady state and a stationary system of linear difference equations. We find, however, that the modifications affect the quantitative predictions of the model. (c) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.