The concept of ‘currency wars’ has come into popular use in recent years. This article examines various meanings of the phrase and its historical antecedents. It goes on to discuss why currency wars have become the focus of attention and the economic policy weapons that may be used...

The IMF presents multilateral surveillance as one of its core responsibilities and has recently sought to enhance this role via a series of multilateral consultations with systemically important countries, designed to coordinate exchange rate and macroeconomic policy in order to reduce the...

In the sequence of currency crises in emerging economies in the 1990s, there was an observed reluctance to devalue the exchange rate. Although ultimately adopted, the decision to devalue was usually delayed, often until it could no longer be avoided. While economic explanations of delay are...