This paper provides a set of stylised facts on the mechanisms through which banking and sovereign distress feed into each other, using a large sample of emerging economies over three decades. We first define “twin crises” as events where banking crises and sovereign defaults combine, and...

This paper studies the effects of delegating control of sovereign debt issuance to an independent authority in a monetary union where public spending decisions are decentralized. The model assumes that no policy makers are capable of commitment to a rule. However, consistent with Rogoff (1985)...

The sovereign debt crisis in the euro area has raised interest in early warning indicators, aimed at signalling the build-up of fiscal stress in advance and helping prevent crises by means of a timely counteraction of fiscal and macroeconomic policies. This paper presents possible improvements...

This paper studies how financial innovation in sovereign debt markets can increase a country’s level of private investment and welfare. I propose a model where public debt has a liquidity purpose for the domestic private sector and is demanded as a saving vehicle by more patient international...

Sovereign debt restructurings do constitute a recurrent phenomenon in emerging and developing economies. Consequently, the international community has repeatedly explored options to increase the predictability and orderliness of debt workouts, of which the debate on the Sovereign Debt...

This paper analyzes the role played by the IMF in eight recent sovereign debt restructurings from a comparative perspective: Argentina (2001-2005), the Dominican Republic (2004-2005), Ecuador (1999-2000), Pakistan (1998-2001), the Russian Federation (1998-2001), Serbia (2000-2004), Ukraine...

In periods of market stress, portfolio reallocations in bond markets reflect both safety and liquidity concerns. Using sovereign and national agency bonds, we construct indicators of liquidity premia in major euro area bond markets; we document the weakening of the correlation between core and...

This paper describes the revenue-raising capacity and structure of the Spanish tax system, in comparison with the economies of the European Union. Spain stands out for the low weight of its tax revenues in GDP relative to the EU27 average. This lower weight of tax revenue is mainly a consequence...

This paper uses a Spanish panel of tax returns and another on household expenditure during the period 1985-1991 to examine the incidence of the introduction in 1988 of tax incentives to retirement savings on contributions to pension funds and on savings. We first identify the population cohorts...

The new Personal Income Tax Law came into force in January 2007. The main changes with respect to the previous regulation are the new tax treatment of personal and family circumstances and saving returns. This study aims to quantify the overall effect of the reform on tax revenue and to assess...