Fiscal consolidation has become an important policy prescription for many emerging market countries (EMCs), particularly for the highly indebted ones. Although prudent fiscal policies tend to reduce vulnerabilities, their implementation is usually postponed. This paper represents, to the best of...

Emerging market countries have enjoyed an exceptionally favorable economic environment throughout 2004, 2005, and early 2006. In particular, accommodative U.S. monetary policy in recent years has helped create an environment of low interest rates in international capital markets. However, if...

This paper studies how financial stress is transmitted from advanced to emerging economies, using a new financial stress index for emerging economies. An episode of financial stress is defined as a period when the financial system''s ability to intermediate may be impaired. Previous financial...

This paper seeks to uncover the main drivers of credit growth in emerging Asia using a multi-country structural vector autoregressive (SVAR) model. Taking a novel approach, we developed a two-block SVAR whereby shocks within blocks are identified using sign restrictions, whereas shocks across...

Episodes of rapid credit growth, especially credit booms, tend to end abruptly, typically in the form of financial crises. This paper presents the findings of a comprehensive event study focusing on 99 credit booms. Loose monetary policy stances seem to have contributed to the build-up of credit...

The debate about the appropriate choice of exchange rate regime is fundamental in international economics. This paper develops a small open-economy model with balance sheet effects and compares the performance of fixed and flexible exchange rate regimes. The model is solved up to a second-order...