The nature of interest rate pass-through can determine the degree of competitiveness among banks and the soundness of the financial system. High speed of long run policy transmission indicates effective interest rate channel. The speed of changes in the lending rates will reflect the impression of investor about monetary policy action. In this study, pass-through of money market interest rate into several retail banking interest rates is examined in Asian cross-country perspective. Applying a Seemingly Unrelated Regression (SUR)approach, the cross-country heterogeneity in the pass-through mechanism is tested. The principal aim of this study is to explore the effectiveness of interest rate transmission mechanism from money market rate or policy rate into retail banking rate in Asian countries. The results provide evaluation on the effectiveness of new monetary policy implemented after crisis in several Asian countries.

Pih Nee Tai is a master student of School of Mathematical Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia. Her main area of study is Statistics.Siok Kun Sek is a Senior Lecturer of School of Mathematical Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia. She obtained her doctoral degree at Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Germany.