In the wake of the global crisis the International Monetary Fund (IMF) increased its exposure to low-and middle-income countries and boosted the overhaul of its lending approach to enhance its role in preventing crises. This paper tests whether IMF lending has targeted countries most affected by...

Since their inception at the end of the Second World War, the sister organizations of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have aimed to consistently speak with one voice vis-agrave;-vis their member governments. However, anecdotal evidence suggests that they often do not...

Public debt sustainability problems are widespread in Sub-Saharan Africa just 10 years after the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries-Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative (HIPC-MDRI) debt write-off. At the same time, public investment needs for the Sustainable Development Goals remain vast. The...

The multinational syndicated loan market has crossed the $7 trillion threshold. Prior literature argues that weak borrower country's creditor rights is the main limiting factor to cross-border lending. We find that lender country's creditor rights can partly substitute for weak borrower creditor...

IMF programs are often considered to carry a “stigma” that triggers adverse market reactions. We show that such a negative IMF effect disappears when accounting for endogenous selection into programs. To proxy for a country's access to financial markets, we use credit ratings and investor...

International Debt Statistics (IDS) 2014 is a continuation of the World Bank???s publications Global Development Finance, Volume II (1997 through 2009) and the earlier World Debt Tables (1973 through 1996). IDS 2014 provides statistical tables showing the external debt of 128 developing...