State-owned financial institutions fall into three main groups: commercial banks, hybrid banks, and development institutions. The larger state-owned commercial banks/ groups include Sberbank, the VTB Bank group, and Gazprombank. Like private commercial banks, these institutions do not have a...

Rapid advances in financial technology are transforming the economic and financial landscape, offering wide-ranging opportunities while raising potential risks. Fintech can support potential growth and poverty reduction by strengthening financial development, inclusion, and efficiency-but it may...

In early 2008, the Fund launched ambitious reforms to enhance its ability to deliver the economic and financial analysis, member support, and multilateral collaboration essential to promote global stability. The reform agenda called for: (i) stronger surveillance through sharpened multilateral...

The global crisis has underscored the need for effective global financial safety nets to protect countries with sound policy frameworks from adverse outcomes. Complementing the traditional crisis resolution role of the IMF, which has been instrumental during the recent crisis and is expected to...

Market reaction to a change in official interest rates will depend on the extent to which the change is anticipated, and on how it is interpreted as a signal of future policy. In this paper, a technique is developed to separate the anticipated and unanticipated components of such changes and is...

This paper assesses the role of the deutsche mark as a key international currency. It first investigates the theoretical basis underlying the international use of a currency. Theoretical considerations indicate that several factors relating to the issuing country—including inflation...