Reducing transaction costs and the need for international reserves is a primary objective to the establishment of regional payment agreements. Another objective, especially in the case of Latin America where the Ecuadorian promoters of the Bank of the South (Banco del Sur) and the New Regional...

The dramatic increase in multinational banks in the late 1990s is a direct result of Washington Consensus-type policies that emphasize the removal of barriers to the free flow of financial capital. In Latin America, foreign banks now control almost half of the total banking activity. Inevitably,...

With the usual debates trumpeting the usual merits of fixed versus flexible exchange rates, or some various incarnations thereof, the authors draw attention to Keynes's original plan for an international clearing union. The paper takes a close look at Joseph Stiglitz's recent suggestions to deal...