We document a decline in the dollar share of international reserves since the turn of the century. This decline reflects active portfolio diversification by central bank reserve managers; it is not a byproduct of changes in exchange rates and interest rates, of reserve accumulation by a small...

We consider public debt from a long-term historical perspective, showing how the purposes for which governments borrow have evolved over time. Periods when debt-to-GDP ratios rose explosively as a result of wars, depressions and financial crises also have a long history. Many of these episodes...

This paper studies whether compliance with the Basel Core Principles for Effective Banking Supervision (BCPs) improves bank soundness. The authors find a significant and positive relationship between bank soundness (measured with Moody''s financial strength ratings) and compliance with...

A study of 53 countries during 1980-95 finds that financial liberalization increases the probability of a banking crisis, but less so where the institutional environment is strong. In particular, respect for the rule of law, a low level of corruption, and good contract enforcement are relevant...

A rapidly growing empirical literature is studying the causes and consequences of bank fragility in present-day economies. The paper reviews the two basic methodologies adopted in cross-country empirical studies-the signals approach and the multivariate probability model-and their application to...

We study how credit market deregulation and increased international financial openness have changed corporate borrowing. The evidence comes from a large panel of publicly traded firms in 38 countries over the period 1994-2002. Reforms are measured with a comprehensive new index that tracks six...

This paper studies whether compliance with the Basel Core Principles for effective banking supervision (BCPs) is associated with bank soundness. Using data for over 3,000 banks in 86countries, we find that neither the overall index of BCP compliance nor its individual components are robustly...

In a large panel of countries, we find that less liquid countries are more likely to default on their external debt. Specifically, for given total external debt, the probability of a crisis increases with the proportion of short-term debt and debt service coming due and decreases with foreign...