Do exports resume when import-restricting temporary trade barriers such as antidumping are finally removed? To establish the importance of this question for emerging economies, this paper uses newly available data from the World Bank's Temporary Trade Barriers Database to update a number of...

This paper introduces the Global Financial Development Database, an extensive dataset of financial system characteristics for 205 economies from 1960 to 2010. The database includes measures of (a) size of financial institutions and markets (financial depth), (b) degree to which individuals can...

This paper provides the first analysis of the Global Financial Inclusion (Global Findex) Database, a new set of indicators that measure how adults in 148 economies save, borrow, make payments, and manage risk. The data show that 50 percent of adults worldwide have an account at a formal...

This paper reviews and synthesizes theoretical and empirical research on the role of finance in developing countries. First, the paper presents the stylized facts about firms in developing nations as well as the legal, financial and broader institutional framework in which these firms operate....

This paper describes important trade-offs that microfinance practitioners, donors, and regulators navigate. Drawing evidence from large, global surveys of microfinance institutions, the authors find a basic tension between meeting social goals and maximizing financial performance. For example,...

Critical appraisals of the current and potential benefits from developing country engagement in the World Trade Organization (WTO) focus mainly on the Doha Round of negotiations. This paper examines developing country participation in the WTO dispute settlement system to enforce foreign market...

The United States use of"zeroing"in its antidumping procedures has become a political flash point threatening some legitimacy of the WTO's dispute settlement system. This paper provides a positive analysis of the zeroing issue, explains how it has evolved and who is likely to be affected by it....

This paper examines the role of the public sector in providing additional information to exporters in developing countries as they seek to monitor and keep open their access to foreign markets by using the rules of the WTO system. It highlights new information generation and dissemination...

What role does the business environment play in promoting and restraining firm growth? Recent literature points to a number of factors as obstacles to growth. Inefficient functioning of financial markets, inadequate security and enforcement of property rights, poor provision of infrastructure,...

This paper examines newly available data from the World Bank-sponsored Global Antidumping Database tracking the worldwide use of trade remedies such as antidumping, countervailing duties, global safeguards and China-specific safeguards during the current economic crisis. The data indicate a...