China's rapid credit expansion in 2009-10 brought local government financing platforms (LGFPs) into the spotlight. This paper discusses their function, reasons behind their recent expansion, and risks they are posing to the financial sector, local governments, and sovereign balance sheet. This...

This paper shows that emerging market equity prices are influenced by growing global factors, and therefore global factors constitute a significant channel for spillovers when the international economic environment changes. Strengthening their resilience to equity price declines remains an...

This paper focuses on evidence from stock markets as it investigates the spillovers from the United States to mainland China and Hong Kong SAR during the subprime crisis. Using both univariate and multivariate GARCH models, this paper finds that China's stock market is not immune to the...

Using three distinct approaches—statistical filtering, production function, and multivariate model— this paper estimates potential growth for China, India, and five ASEAN countries (Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam) during 1993–2013. The main...

Korea’s rapid growth has slowed in recent years, suggesting lower potential growth. This paper uses an array of techniques, including statistical filters, a multivariate model and the production function, to estimate Korea’s potential growth. The main finding is that trend growth...

In recent years, portfolio flows to emerging markets have become increasingly large and volatile. Using weekly portfolio fund flows data, the paper finds that their short-run dynamics are driven mostly by global “push†factors. To what extent do these cross-border flows and global risk...

In recent years, macroprudential policy has become an increasingly active policy area. Many countries have adopted it as a tool to safeguard financial stability, in particular to deal with the credit and asset price cycles driven by global capital flows. This paper reviews the use of key...

The global financial crisis originated in advanced economies, but had a major impact on emerging markets. The impact, however, was not uniform. Even in a relatively homogenous group of countries such as ASEAN-4 (Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand), there were considerable...

The “middle-income trap” is the phenomenon of hitherto rapidly growing economies stagnating at middle-income levels and failing to graduate into the ranks of high-income countries. In this study we examine the middle-income trap as a special case of growth slowdowns, which are identified as...

This paper explores export and import dynamics in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), both regionally and across various country groups. The findings underscore the significant associations that domestic demand and exports have with import changes, albeit the magnitude of these associations varies across...