When the spectacular devaluation of the peso occurred at the end of 1994, 91-day swap lines of credit of $3 billion each-dollars for pesos-were available to the Bank of Mexico at the Federal Reserve and the Treasury's Exchange Stabilization Fund (ESF). These were known as regular swap lines. The...

Since 1959 the U. S. has experienced six recessions, not counting the recession that began, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research, in March 2001. If the date the latest recession ended is taken to be 12/01, in line with Chairman Greenspan?s testimony on March 7, 2002, that...

In 2000, in 20 buyback operations, the Treasury purchased a total of $30 billion of par value marketable debt that it had previously issued, with maturities ranging from 12 to 27 years. In each of the first two quarters of 2001, it will purchase, in two buyback operations per month, about $9...

In a luncheon speech at the AEA meeting on January 3, 1999, Stanley Fischer argued the case, in a reformed international financial system for ?an agency that will act as lender of last resort for countries facing a crisis.? He asserts that there is a need for such an agency and ?that the IMF is...

Having lost its Bretton Woods role as a regulator of exchange rates and source of short-term balance-of-payments assistance, the IMF has since been an organization in search of a reason for it to exist. Had it been content to serve its members by keeping records of their monetary and economic...