"Despite recently announced delays, Basel II--the new standard for bank capital--is due to be completed this year for implementation in the 13 Basel Committee member countries by the end of 2006. Should the other 170 plus member countries of the World Bank also adopt Basel II? Basel II was not...

The taxation of non-renewable resources in Latin America : introduction and overview -- The effects of commodity taxation on sector performance -- Towards efficient taxation of minerals : the case of copper in Chile -- Two sectors, two approaches : resource taxation in Peru -- Not all fields are...

International financial institutions (IFIs) generally enjoy preferred creditors treatment (PCT). Although PCT rarely appears in legal contracts, when sovereigns restructure bilateral or commercial debts they normally pay IFIs in full. This paper presents a model where a creditor, such as an IFI,...

In the early 1990s, after decades of high inflation and financial repression, Argentina embarked on a course of macroeconomic and bank regulatory reform. Bank regulatory policy promoted privatization, financial liberalization, and free entry, limited safety net support, and established a novel...

The thrust of government policy in the British electricity industry has been to create a competitive and transparen t commodity market. To this end there has been a separation of supply from distribution and an independent company operates a transparent spot market, known as the pool. However,...