The role of futures markets in stabilizing spot prices has been extensively discussed. Nevertheless, the ability of these markets to achieve the stabilizing function significantly depends on whether they are "efficient" in the sense that futures prices "fully reflect" the available information....

The paper examines over seventy episodes of current account adjustment in industrial and major emerging market economies. It argues that these episodes were characterised by strongly divergent economic developments. To reduce this divergence, the paper classifies episodes with similar...