This paper reports first results from a survey of 404 middle-sized and large manufacturing firms from 40 Russian regions in April-June 2003. We examine the extent of social service and infrastructure provision by the firms and the firms’ assessment of the quality of public infrastructure and...

This paper focuses on the role of the banking sector in monetary policy transmission in an emerging economy with a rapidly developing financial system. Specifically, we exam whether the central bank's monetary policy stance affects banks' lending behaviour. Based on a comprehensive quarterly...

This paper focuses on the role of the banking sector in monetary policy transmission in an emerging economy with a rapidly developing financial system. Specifically, we exam whether the central bank's monetary policy stance affects banks' lending behaviour. Based on a comprehensive quarterly...

Russian industrial enterprises inherited from the Soviet era a tradition of producing welfare and infrastructure services within the firm, also for outside users. Despite the massive restructuring of the economy that took place since, many firms are still active in service provision. At the same...

IIn the planned economy firms were made responsible for providing their workers with so-cial services, such as housing, day care and medical care. In the transforming Russia of the 1990s, social assets were to be transferred from industrial enterprises to the public sector. The law on divestment...

We assess the determinants of equilibrium real exchange rates in a sample of oil-dependent countries. Our basic data cover OPEC countries from 1975 to 2005. We also include three oil-producing Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries in our robustness analysis. Utilising several...