Starting with the international debt crisis in the early 1980s, the volume of international barter trade increased substantially. This paper examines how barter can help highly indebted countries to finance imports if they cannot use standard credit arrangements. We argue that payment in goods...

We examine the view that the recent East Asian crisis was precipitated by bursting asset price bubbles which had been fuelled by strong capital inflows which were largely the result of a moral hazard problem in financial intermediation, and was exacerbated by a vicious cycle of asset price...

In recent decades, foreign assets and liabilities in advanced countries have grown rapidly relative to GDP, with the increase in gross cross-holdings far exceeding the size of net positions. Moreover, the portfolio equity and FDI categories have grown in importance relative to international debt...

This paper discusses the way in which the existence of debt denominated in both domestic and foreign currency affects debt-sustainability analyses. Ignoring valuation issues can lead to misleading conclusions regarding fiscal sustainability. We show that a devaluation of the domestic currency...

There is a large and growing literature that studies the effects of weak enforcement institutions on economic performance. This literature has focused almost exclusively on primary markets, in which assets are issued and traded to improve the allocation of investment and consumption. The general...

Recent sovereign defaults are accompanied by interest rate spikes and deep recessions. This paper develops a small open economy model to study default risk and its interaction with output and foreign debt. Default probabilities and interest rates depend on incentives for repayment. Default is...

This paper studies whether the poorest and most indebted countries receive aid in the form of grants rather than loans. By studying bilateral aid flows to low- and middle-income countries between 1975 and 2005, the paper provides evidence on the determinants of the grant component of aid flows....

It is now clear that the global economic crisis has hit the Russian economy. The resulting shock clearly shows not only the global economic imbalance but also the distinct characteristics of emerging Russian markets. The Russian economy already changed its structure under the high economic...

The boom of world trade, the unprecedented openness of domestic markets, regional integration, and the persistence and magnitude of globalisation are as many challenges to the management of the internal balance between revenues and expenditures, both in the context of international, regional,...

The paper explores whether and how current lending-of-last-resort practices can be extended beyond national borders. It argues that what makes lending of last resort effective at the national level is a blend of resource availability, technical discretion, ex-ante supervision, and powers of...