Employing cointegration techniques, the long-run determinants of Madagascar's real exchange rate are examined from a stock-flow perspective. The long-run behavior of the real effective exchange rate is explained by the net foreign asset position and factors affecting trade flows. An index of the...

This paper examines financial market comovements across European transition economies and compares their experience to that of their regions. Correlations in monthly indices of exchange market pressures can partly be explained by direct trade linkages, but not by measures of other fundamentals....

This paper analyzes the effects of IMF member countries participation in the IMF’s Data Standards Initiatives (DSI) on the statistical quality of WEO forecasts. Results show that WEO forecasts for SDDS subscribers are in general better than for GDDS participants and those member countries...

This paper discusses the estimation of models of the term structure of interest rates. After reviewing the term structure models, specifically the Nelson-Siegel Model and Affine Term- Structure Model, this paper estimates the terms structure of Treasury bond yields for the United States with...

The 2008 crisis underscored the interconnectedness of the international business cycle, with U.S. shocks leading to the largest global slowdown since the 1930s. We estimate spillover effects across major advanced country regions in a structural VAR (SVAR) using pre-crisis data. Our new method...

We study the effects of oil-price shocks on the U.S. economy combining narrative and quantitative approaches. After examining daily oil-related events since 1984, we classify them into various event types. We then develop measures of exogenous shocks that avoid endogeneity and predictability...

We document information rigidity in forecasts for real GDP growth in 46 countries over the past two decades. We investigate: (i) if rigidities are lower around turning points in the economy, such as in times of recessions and crises; (ii) if rigidities differ across countries, particularly...

The paper evaluates how increases in banks’ and nonfinancial corporates’ default risk are transmitted in the global economy, using in a vector autoregression model for 30 advanced and emerging economies for the period from January 1996 to December 2008. The results point to two-way...

Since 1999, the IMF's staff has been tracking several early-warning-system (EWS) models of currency crisis. The results have been mixed. One of the long-horizon models has performed well relative to pure guesswork and to available non-model-based forecasts, such as agency ratings and private...

The World Economic Outlook (WEO) is a key source of forecasts of global economic conditions. It is therefore important to review the performance of these forecasts against both actual outcomes and alternative forecasts. This paper conducts a series of statistical tests to evaluate the quality of...