Over the last decade, Hungary has experienced more foreign bank entry than any country in world, starting with foreign greenfield operations and then followed by the privatization of four of its largest banks to strategic foreign owners. Currently about two thirds of all banking assets in...

Bulgaria has operated a currency board since 1997. It is expected to join the EU in 2007 and the EMU thereafter. This paper uses survey data to analyze public attitudes toward adoption of the euro in advance of EMU membership. Bulgarians are equally split in support for and opposition to...

In this paper, we provide a novel rationale for credit ratings. The rationale that we propose is that credit ratings can serve as a coordinating mechanism in situations where multiple equilibria can obtain. We show that credit ratings provide a "focal point" for firms and their investors. We...

This paper considers the Russian privatization process through the end of voucher privatization and examines how its deviation from the competitive sale standard was likely to affect wealth inequality. While empirical evaluation is all but impossible due to the dearth of reliable data, it is...

In the aftermath of sovereign default of August 1998, the hypothesis of virtual economy in Russia developed by Gaddy and Ickes has gained popularity. The hypothesis states that the country has not moved towards free-market economy but developed a system of implicit price subsidization similar to...

Small start-up firms are the engine of job creation in early transition and yet little is known about the characteristics of this new sector. We seek to identify patterns of job growth in this sector in terms of niches left from central planning and ask about differences in job creation across...

Using a database from post-communist, pre-deposit-insurance Russia, we demonstrate the presence of quantity-based sanctioning of weaker banks by both firms and households, particularly after the financial crisis of 1998. Evidence for the standard form of price discipline, however, is notably...

Previous research suggests that minorities are not faring well in China’s transition—both income and occupational attainment gaps are widening. We are particularly interested in whether the differences in majority and minority economic outcomes are the result of ethnicity per se, or whether...

Despite their progress Bulgaria and Romania significantly differ from the EU economies. In this article, on the basis of the theoretical and empirical achievements of the theory of optimal and (endogenous) currency areas we study to what extent the two South European economies are able to adopt...

Prospects for Russia’s membership in the WTO now look better than any point since accession negotiations began almost a decade ago. Good progress with economic and legal reforms within Russia has left the country’s economy better prepared for membership. Nevertheless, the economy still...