Colloquium: Rita Maghularia (TU Dresden) "Do Immigrants Affect Crime? Evidence for Germany" und Jantke de Boer (TU Dresden) "Essays on Exchange Rates"

Abstract Rita Maghularia "Do immigrants affect crime? Evidence for Germany":    The paper empirically analyses the causal relationship between immigrants and crime using data for German administrative districts between 2008 and 2019. Before the refugee crisis (2008–2014), an increase in the current share of immigrants increased the total crime rate. In contrast, the effect was negative (or insignificant) during and after the refugee crisis (2015–2019). When analysing the total period, the estimates average out to zero. In addition, the results point towards a dynamic adjustment to past immigration. Studying more closely the composition of the migrant group, we find evidence that the negative (or insignificant) effect of immigrants on crime in the later period is related to a larger share of migrants with a less certain residence status.

Abstract Jantke de Boer (TU Dresden) "Essays on Exchange Rates":                             The difficulty in identifying economic variables that co-move with exchange rates, commonly referred to as “exchange rate disconnect”, has been documented by a large literature. My dissertation compromises three papers on explaining the cross-sectional variation of exchange rates with macroeconomic fundamentals, for instance, countries’ external portfolios. Using cross-country portfolio compositions, I construct a network centrality measure where a country is central if it is integrated with countries that account for a large share in the global asset supply. I find that currency excess returns and interest rates decrease in network centrality. The network centralities are persistent over time and offer a country-specific economic source of risk that drives differences in currency excess returns. Negative global shocks cause currencies of central countries to appreciate, while currencies of peripheral countries depreciate. This is consistent with the idea that currency excess returns compensate for time-varying risk: persistent interest rate differentials are reversed by predictable exchange rate movements.