This 2014 Article IV Consultation highlights that the economic expansion in New Zealand is becoming increasingly embedded and broad based, with growth exceeding 3 percent in the second half of 2013. The drivers include supportive financial conditions, record high export commodity prices,...

New Zealand’s economy continued to grow at a moderate rate, in part reflecting the effects of the recent drought and inflation. The macroeconomic policy has been framed to absorb adverse shocks with flexible exchange rates to serve as buffer. The planned pace of deficit reduction is...

This paper studies the dynamics of net foreign liabilities across a number of countries. Our historical analysis suggests that an orderly reduction in a country’s net foreign liabilities has mostly occurred when there was significant improvement in gross public savings through deliberate...

The paper finds that, given New Zealand’s conservative approach in implementing the Basel II framework, New Zealand banks’ headline capital ratios underestimate their capital strength. A comparison with Canadian, UK and Australian banks highlights the impact of New Zealand’s...

This paper analyses the characteristics and functioning of real estate markets. It focuses on the relationship between developments in these markets and the financial sector to determine under what circumstances real estate booms and busts can develop and how they can affect the health and...

This Selected Issues paper for Belgium evaluates whether price increases in Belgium are excessive. It assesses the household and bank balance sheets and their vulnerability to a slowdown in housing prices, and identifies differences in real estate markets between Belgium and other countries. The...

In this paper we use a disequilibrium framework common in the “credit crunch†literature, first to examine whether the slow credit growth in Morocco during the rapid expansion of liquidity in the first half of the decade can be attributed to credit rationing, and second to investigate...

Korean household debt has reached 148 percent of disposable income, high by emerging market standards. Most of this debt remains at variable rates, shifting the interest rate risk from better diversified financial institutions to households and increasing their sensitivity to macroeconomic...

We implement a three-step procedure to assess the extent of exposure to real estate in commercial banks. First, we demonstrate interest rates and income to be the major determinants of delinquency. Then, we adopt a stress testing approach to calculate the impact of any adverse changes in these...