The literature on the East Asian crisis has concentrated almost exclusively on the five crisis-hit economies of Indonesia, Korea, Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines (Asia-5). Relatively scant attention has been paid to the twin cities of Hong Kong and Singapore, both of which also suffered...

Much of the recent literature on the East Asian crisis of 1997-98 has focused on the sudden capital reversals and the accompanying regional bust. An oft ignored fact is that the bust was preceded by a prolonged boom period. This boom was fuelled primarily by large-scale capital inflows...

Free Trade Areas (FTAs) have recently become an integral part of Singapore trade policy. This paper discusses the reasons behind Singapore's recent embracement of 'new regionalism' with particular reference to the proposals to form FTAs with Japan and the US. The paper goes on to examine various...

Following the East Asian crisis, some prominent economists have advocated that small and open economies in Asia adopt an irrevocably fixed regime. Such a hard peg, it is argued, signals greater commitment to rule out arbitrary exchange rate adjustments as well as the authorities (IM) willingness...

This paper examines Thailand's exchange rate policy, focusing on the degree of the country's real exchange rate misalignment pre-crisis, and their consequent effects on Thailand's trade balance with its two large trading partners, the US and Japan. We estimate misalignment as the difference...