Developing Asia experienced a sharp surge in foreign currency reserves prior to the 2008-9 crisis. The global crisis has been associated with an unprecedented rise of swap agreements between central banks of larger economies and their counterparts in smaller economies. We explore whether such...

We take stock of and compare tax revenue trends in Asia and Latin America. The tax revenues to GDP ratios increased significantly in both regions in the 2000s, although they remain visibly below European levels. Our analysis portrays a complex picture of the tax collection challenges facing...

We use data from the Groningen Growth and Development Centre (GGDC) database to perform preliminary empirical analysis of the interplay between quality and quantity of finance in accounting for the output growth of ten sectors. We review the existing literature and some salient open questions...

We analyze the sovereign bond issuance data of eight major emerging markets (EMs) - Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Russia, South Africa and Turkey from 1970 to 2018. Our analysis suggests that (i) EM local currency bonds tend to be smaller in size, shorter in maturity, or lower in...

Productivity growth is slowing around the world. In 2014, according to the Conference Board's Total Economy Data Base, the growth of total factor productivity (TFP) hovered around zero for the third straight year, down from 1 per cent in 1996-2006 and ½ per cent in 2007-12. In this paper we...

We empirically assess the relative importance of various economic fundamentals in accounting for the sovereign credit default swap (CDS) spreads of emerging markets during 2004-2012, which encompasses the global financial crisis of 2008-2009. Inflation, state fragility, external debt, and...

We investigate the relationship between economic growth and lagged international capital flows, disaggregated into FDI, portfolio investment, equity investment, and short-term debt. We follow about 100 countries during 1990-2010 when emerging markets became more integrated into the international...

Using international data starting in 1957, we construct a sample of cases where fast-growing economies slow down. The evidence suggests that rapidly growing economies slow down significantly, in the sense that the growth rate downshifts by at least 2 percentage points, when their per capita...