A review of the experience of five developing countries in reforming their financial systems illustrates the benefits and risks, and provides lessons on the factors which contribute to successful financial sector reforms. Financial sector reforms need to be supported by active monetary policy,...

A taxonomy of existing and planned automated trade execution systems in financial markets is provided. Over 50 automated market structures in 16 countries are analyzed. The classification scheme is organized around the principle that such markets consist of an algorithm that performs a trade...

The purpose of this lecture is to look beyond the complex events that characterize the global financial and economic crisis, identify the basic mechanisms, and infer the policies needed to resolve the current crisis, as well as the policies needed to reduce the probability of similar events in...

The paper proposes a framework for examining the process of financial market development. The framework, consistent with the functional view of financial system design, is anchored in studying the incentives facing the key players in financial markets-borrowers, lenders, liquidity providers, and...

The Global Credit Crisis of 2008-09 has underscored the urgency of reforming the international financial architecture. While a number of short-term reforms are already in train, this paper contemplates more ambitious reforms of the international financial architecture that might be implemented...

This paper examines the Argentine experience with GDP-indexed warrants in order to gauge the existence of a novelty premium on new financial instruments. It develops a Monte Carlo pricing exercise to calculate the expected net present value of payments, on the basis of various forecast...

This study investigates the relationship between production efficiency in financial intermediation and financial system size. The study predicts and tests for the existence of "systemic scale economies" (SSEs), whereby value-maximizing intermediaries operating in large systems are expected to...

This paper examines the impact of macroeconomic and financial sector policy announcements in the United States, the United Kingdom, the euro area, and Japan during the recent crisis on interbank credit and liquidity risk premia. Announcements of interest rate cuts, liquidity support, liability...

A survey of the financial systems of Caribbean countries reveals systems dominated by banks, with services widely available. Jamaica is the only country to have experienced a financial crisis. The paper describes recent improvements in the regulatory framework, and examines factors, which affect...

This paper associates both the increase in risk taken by wholesale banks in the United States and the decline in earnings at wholesale banks in Japan with a reduction in the franchise value of wholesale banking. In contrast with the conventional view that relates the franchise value of banking...