This paper looks at the causes of the reduction in trade finance in South East Asian countries post-1997, with a particular focus on the role of export credit agencies. It concludes that while such agencies did not cause or prolong the problem, they did not contribute significantly to a...

This paper exploits a panel dataset comprising 1,565 banks in 20 emerging countries during 1989- 2001 and compares the response of the volume of loans and the rates on loans and deposits to various measures of monetary conditions across domestic and foreign banks. It also looks for systematic...

This paper investigates the long-run pattern of private saving in Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand. These countries have not only maintained saving levels that are currently among the highest in the world but have also experienced a sustained increase in their rate of private saving...

This paper examines empirical determinants of private saving for a sample of economies in Southeast Asia and Latin America over the period 1975–95. It uses panel estimations to establish relationships between private saving rates and a range of policy and nonpolicy variables. The findings show...

The scramble to expand deposit guarantees in Europe in response to recent financial turmoil confirms that the on-going integration of European financial markets requires closer coordination of prudential policies and financial safety nets. We study the optimal design of prudential supervision...

Shocks stemming from Brazil - the large neighbor in South America - have historically been a source of concern for policy-makers in other countries of the region. This paper studies the importance of Brazil's influence on its neighboring economies, documenting trade linkages over the last two...