This paper examines real and financial spillovers from monetary policy shocks originating in the US and the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to advanced and emerging economies in Asia over the period 2000 to 2020. Using a structural vector autoregression (SVAR) approach, we find that Asian economies overall are more susceptible to spillovers to GDP, inflation and the current account emanating from monetary policy shocks in the PRC as opposed to the US. This is related to high inter-regional trade integration in Asia and in line with previous research findings. However, while the prevailing literature highlights the dominant role of US monetary policy as a transmitter of shocks to global and Asian financial markets, we find that emerging Asian economies are more susceptible to monetary shocks emanating from the PRC in respect of equity markets and exchange rates. This can be explained by the rising synchronization of Asian financial markets vis-à-vis the PRC as the financial account in the PRC has gradually opened.

JEL codes: Q54, G10