Major resource discoveries have transformed growth prospects for many low-income countries. However, the sharp downturn in commodity prices in recent years is affecting resource investment in these countries, and may delay the development of recent discoveries into production. This study...

The world economy has experienced four global recessions over the past seven decades: in 1975, 1982, 1991, and 2009. During each of these episodes, annual real per capita global gross domestic product contracted, and this contraction was accompanied by weakening of other key indicators of global...

Emerging market and developing economies have experienced recurrent episodes of rapid debt accumulation over the past fifty years. This paper examines the consequences of debt accumulation using a three-pronged approach: an event study of debt accumulation episodes in 100 emerging market and...

Trade growth has slowed sharply since the global financial crisis. U.S. trade data highlights that arm's-length trade--trade between unaffiliated firms--accounts disproportionately for the overall post-crisis trade slowdown. This is partly because arm's-length trade depends more heavily than...

The paper studies the extent of global inflation synchronization using a dynamic factor model in a large set of countries over a half century. The authors' methodology allows them to account for differences across groups of countries (advanced economies and emerging market and developing...