The proliferation of overlapping free trade agreements (FTA) in the recent years has led to hub-and-spokes (HAS) throughout the world. Being avid subscribers to FTAs, many countries in the Asia-Pacific region including the USA, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, Thailand and Australia have become...

The new-style currency crises that have inflicted a number of developing and emerging economies of late are characterized by sudden stops in capital inflows and adverse balance sheet effects. Given the potential high costs of these crises, there remains an ongoing debate on how they might best...

Modelling and forecasting of interest rates has traditionally proceeded in the framework of linear stationary models such as ARMA and VAR, but only with moderate success. We examine here four models which account for several specific features of real world asset prices such as non-stationarity...

A widely agreed proposition in modern economics is that policy rules have greater advantage over discretion in improving economic performance. Simple monetary policy instrument rules are feasible options for developing countries lacking the pre-requisites for more sophisticated targeting rules....

Japan has reached the limits of conventional macroeconomic policy. In order to overcome deflation and achieve sustainable economic growth, the Bank of Japan (BOJ) recently set an inflation target of 2% and implemented an aggressive monetary policy so this target could be achieved as soon as...

Japan has reached the limits of conventional macroeconomic policy. In order to overcome deflation and achieve sustainable economic growth, the Bank of Japan (BOJ) recently set an inflation target of 2% and implemented an aggressive monetary policy so this target could be achieved as soon as...

Rapid trade-led economic growth in emerging Asia has been shifting the global economic and industrial centres of gravity away from the north Atlantic, raising the importance of Asia in world trade but also altering the commodity composition of trade by Asia and other regions. What began...

Rapid trade-led economic growth in emerging Asia has been shifting the global economic and industrial centres of gravity away from the north Atlantic, raising the importance of Asia in world trade but also altering the commodity composition of trade by Asia and other regions. What began...

Food miles measure the distance food travels to reach consumers plates. Although substituting local food for imported produce will not necessarily reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, the food miles movement is an intuitively appealing idea to consumers and supported by import-competing...

Although the overall economic performance of economies in South Asia in recent years has been impressive, there is concern that an aging and increasingly inadequate infrastructure may limit the potential for further growth and economic development. A critical infrastructure component is the...