There is a wide range of theories that try to explain interactions between politics end economy that are referred as political cycles. Majority of these theories aims at analysis of changes in economic outcomes that are related to elections or other phenomena in the political reality. To induce...

We evaluate proposals for independent fiscal authority put forward as a solution to excessive public spending. Our main conclusion is that moving the responsibility to set broad measures of fiscal policy from the hands of government to an independent fiscal council is not necessarily welfare...

This paper examines procyclicality of the financial system. The introduction describes the natural and regulatory sources of procyclicality, focusing on the potential procyclical effect of the current Basel II regulatory framework for banks. It also mentions the regulatory tools for mitigating...

This paper focuses on how to calibrate models used to stress test the most important risks in the banking system. Based on the results of a verification of the Czech National Bank’s stress testing methodology, the paper argues that stress tests should be calibrated conservatively and slightly...

The article discusses the role of foreign banks and foreign lending in the CEE countries from the financial stability perspective using the data on international banking business. The pattern of foreign banks’ involvement is analyzed and the risk of cross-border contagion explored, focusing on...

The paper compares the quality of the institutional framework of the Czech Republic with other new EU Member States and the EU 15 average using the World Bank data on Governance Indicators and argues that the pressure from the EU institutions during the accession negotiations period to reform...

In the present paper we examine whether financial markets could have helped predict exchange rates in three selected Central and Eastern European (CEE) economies of the EU, namely the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland, during the current financial crisis. To this end, we derive risk-neutral...

This paper presents the results of an analysis of data on individual bank loans of non-financial corporations in the Czech Republic taken from the CNB’s Central Credit Register. It focuses on the question of how firms obtain financing from domestic banks. The results show that the vast...

This paper analyzes political pressure on the National Bank of Slovakia, using the Havrilesky (1993) methodology based on media signalling. This methodology allows the pressure on the Central Bank of Slovakia to be compared with the pressure on the central banks to which the methodology was...

This paper analyzes political pressure on the National Bank of Slovakia, using the Havrilesky (1993) methodology based on media signalling. This methodology allows the pressure on the Central Bank of Slovakia to be compared with the pressure on the central banks to which the methodology was...