Recent financial crises in emerging markets have been followed by temporary but substantial losses in output. This paper explores the possibility that threats of such losses are the dominant incentive for repayment of international debt. In this environment private debtors and creditors have...

This paper focuses on the 1995 Latin American and 1997 East Asian crises using an insurance-based model of financial crises. First the model of Dooley (forthcoming) is described. Second, some empirical evidence for an insurance model is presented. The key variables in this approach include the...

We find that emerging markets appeared to be somewhat insulated from developments in U.S. financial markets from early 2007 to summer 2008. From that point on, however, emerging markets responded very strongly to the deteriorating situation in the U.S. financial system and real economy. Policy...

In this paper we argue that net capital inflows to the United States did not cause the financial crisis that now engulfs the world economy. A crisis caused by such flows has been widely predicted but that crisis has not occurred. Indeed, the international monetary system still operates in the...

We identify incentives generated by the Bretton Woods II system that may have contributed to the sub-prime liquidity crisis now working its way through the international monetary system. We then evaluate the persistent conjecture that the liquidity crisis is or will become a balance of payments...

In this essay, we argue that key assumptions in international macroeconomic theory, though useful for understanding the economic relationships among developed countries, have been pushed beyond their competence to include relationships between developed economies and emerging markets. The...

This paper examines the role of the third party (the IMF) in resolving sovereign default on external debt. We first show that the effects of third party intervention in debt negotiations are quite sensitive to the assumed enforcement mechanism for sovereign debt. The model is then adapted to an...

Models of financial crises based on distortions in capital markets have strong implications for the behavior of investors leading up to crises. In this paper we evaluate the hypothesis that deregulation of financial markets in Korea provided the incentives and opportunities for a sequence of...