"The authors revisit the debt overhang question. They first use nonparametric techniques to isolate a panel of countries on the downward sloping section of a debt Laffer Curve. In particular, overhang countries are ones where a threshold level of debt is reached in sample, beyond which (initial)...

"The authors use preliminary results from an ongoing effort to construct estimates of debt relief to study its allocation across a sample of 62 low-income countries. They find some evidence that debt relief, particularly from multilateral creditors, has been allocated to countries with better...

"Private debt flows to developing countries surged to record levels over the period 2003-07. A few low-income countries have gained access to the international bond market but the bulk of the flows have continued to go to just a few large middle-income countries. Most low-income countries still...

"This paper relaxes some key assumptions in the probabilistic approach to fiscal sustainability. First, the authors identify structural breaks over the sample period used to estimate the covariance matrix of the shocks to the debt ratios. Second, the assumption of normality of the shocks is...

"Despite significant progress in economic reform throughout the 1990s and an exemplary development of the policymaking framework in the second part of the decade, Brazil suffered a major public debt and currency crisis in 2002. Though the political origin of the uncertainty cannot be ignored,...

"Greece and Italy initiated efforts to improve public debt management and develop their domestic debt markets respectively in the late 1970s and mid-1980s. At that time, both countries suffered from large and rapidly growing public debt, excessive reliance on short-term bills held by commercial...