The volatile movements in commodity prices during the last years have raised new questions to be discussed in both policy and academic spheres. Up to the financial slump of the second quarter of 2008 commodity prices grew fast for several consecutive years in a highly volatile context. The...

This paper aims at identifying the underlying reasons for substantial accumulation of foreign reserves, a strategy currently followed by a large number of countries. To this end, it first studies international liquidity conditions and individual country demand for reserves. It then analyses...