Tony chieh-tse Hou National Dong Hwa University, Hualien, Taiwan   No. 1, Sec. 2, Da Hsueh Rd. Shoufeng Hualien, 97401 Taiwan, R.O.C.   houc@mail.ndhu.edu.tw             JEL Areas: G2 : Financial Institutions and Services: General E : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics