Financial safety nets in Asia have come a long way since the Asian Financial Crisis (AFC) of 1997–98. Not wanting to rely solely on the International Monetary Fund (IMF) again, the Chiang Mai Initiative (CMI) was created in 2000. When the CMI also proved inadequate following the...

A key lesson of the 2007–2009 global financial crisis (GFC) was the importance of containing systemic financial risk and the need for a “macroprudential†approach to surveillance and regulation that can identify system-wide risks and take appropriate actions to maintain...

This paper evaluates the extent of exchange rate coordination among Asian economies using a hypothetical Asian Currency Unit. Rising interdependence among Asian economies makes it vital for these economies to have a certain degree of exchange rate stability. However, the empirical evidence...

This paper argues that calls for a New Bretton Woods system in the aftermath of the global economic crisis—similar to the remarkable 1944 Bretton Woods conference that led to the establishment of various international economic institutions—are unlikely to be answered. The likely...

Half of the world’s population—3 billion people—lives below the poverty line, and Asia has the largest share. In pursuit of sustainable economic development and poverty alleviation, there is great potential among low-income households for green consumption, production,...

Pension assets have seen rapid growth world-wide over the past decades, although they suffered large losses during the global financial crisis of 2007–2008. Such growth is notably due to both structural and parametric pension reforms since the 1980s. In the Asian region too, the pension...

Rapid trade-led economic growth in emerging Asia has been shifting the global economic and industrial centres of gravity away from the north Atlantic, raising the importance of Asia in world trade but also altering the commodity composition of trade by Asia and other regions. What began...

Rapid population ageing and economic transformation in Asia raise the policy challenge of ensuring income security in old age. There is growing interest among policymakers in the potential role of noncontributory transfers as an instrument to address a variety of policy challenges, including old...

New lessons, challenges, and debates have emerged from the subprime crisis in the United States. While the macroeconomic orientation is not new and has always been among the classic toolkits of central banks for ensuring financial stability, the current explicit articulation and specification of...

The paper gives an assessment of the progress made in developing local debt markets in emerging Asia. Market development has been limited by hurdles confronting borrowers and lenders, current and potential liquidity providers, and insufficient support from government policies and regulations....