Archived Series > World Economic and Financial Surveys
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Abstract
These studies, prepared by the staff of the International Monetary Fund, comprise supporting material for the analyses and scenarios in the World Economic Outlook and provide a more detailed examination of the theory and evidence on some major issues affecting the global economy, commodity prices, and individual countries.
Abstract
The global trend toward lilberalization in countries international payments and transfer systems has been widespread in both industrial and developing countries and most dramatic in Central and Eastern Europe. Countries in general have brought their exchange systems more in line with market principles and moved toward more flexible exchange rate arrangements. This study updates previous studies published under the title Developments in International Exchange and Payments Systems.
Abstract
This study reviews major issues and developments in trade and their implications for the work of the IMF. Volume I, The Uruguay Round and Beyond: Principal Issues, gives an overview of the issues and developments in the world trading system. Volume II, The Uruguay Round and Beyond: Background Papers, presents detailed background papers on selected trade and trade-related issues. This study updates previous studies published under the title Issues and Development in International Trade Policy.
Abstract
This paper reports the growing number of low-income countries that are making efforts to resolve their debt problems, often aided by the resources of the debt reduction facility for countries of the International Development Association (IDA). Progress for most, however, remains slow. With the backing of IDA resources and assistance from official bilateral sources, debt buy-backs have been concluded by Bolivia, Guyana, Mozambique, Niger, Sao Tome and Principe, Uganda, and Zambia. Preliminary discussions on similar operations are under way with several other countries. Although most of the major baric debt cases have been resolved, attention still needs to be focused on the problems of low-income countries. In many of these countries, the process of debt restructuring has been delayed owing to economic and political difficulties. To maintain market access on reasonable terms, countries need consistently to implement strong macroeconomic and structural policy programs. Maintenance of such programs is likely to be particularly important in the period ahead, given the high degree of uncertainty with regard to interest rate movements in the industrial countries.
Abstract
This paper presents the international financial markets aspects of the current turbulence in emerging markets. The ongoing international diversification of institutional portfolios, the return of flight capital, and the cyclical developments in industrial countries combined to generate a significant volume of capital flows into emerging markets in the developing world. In keeping with developments in global markets, these flows have increasingly been in the form of purchases of tradable bonds, equities, and money market instruments—securities that can readily be sold when sentiments change. The volume of financial wealth that can flee a developing country is now sufficiently large that it can overwhelm any attempt to maintain an exchange rate incompatible with fundamentals. Thus the possibility for investors—domestic and foreign—to exert discipline over policy has strengthened significantly. The resolution of sovereign debt-servicing difficulties has become more complicated with the changes in instruments and participants in international markets.
Abstract
This paper focuses on the private nonfinancial sectors of the affected economies, financial liberalization provided households and businesses with greater access to credit markets. This contributed to the long period of expansion during the 1980s. Partly as a result of major changes to the financial systems, several industrial countries had a boom in asset markets associated with a period of asset accumulation, an unprecedented buildup of debt, a sharp increase in relative asset prices, and related increases in household wealth. The expansion in household financial activity in the United Kingdom during the 1980s was paralleled by a sizable boom in investment spending and an increase in corporate debt. The structure of balance sheets was also affected by mergers and acquisitions that led to a further expansion in corporate debt. New types of bank loans and accounts have prevented even greater disintermediation but have also reduced net interest margins because more deposits now earn market-related rates of return.
Abstract
This paper focuses mainly on official bilateral and multilateral financing for countries that have rescheduled their debts to official bilateral creditors. In contrast to the approaches taken by private lenders, official creditors have continued to provide new financing on a large scale to countries with debt-servicing difficulties that implement adjustment and reform programs. Financial support bas been provided through a wide variety of instruments and channels. For the low-income rescheduling countries as a group, total financial assistance has been about as large as these countries' own export earnings in every year since 1986. The recent trends in official financing have important ramifications for developing countries. Access to external financing from official sources is likely to remain high for those countries whose adjustment and reform efforts provide assurances that resources will be used efficiently. Conversely, countries with uneven records of policy implementation (particularly as regards payments arrears) are likely to find difficulty in attracting financial support.
Abstract
This paper analyzes the origins of the recent turbulence in government bond markets in the major industrial countries, and considers whether the role of hedge funds in that episode argues for altering present regulatory arrangements. In financial markets, it is possible for such a revision of expectations—if it is shared by all market participants—to alter asset prices almost immediately; indeed, the change in asset prices can occur without any transactions even taking place. In this case, however, trading volumes soared along with the rise in bond yields, as a broad spectrum of market participants sought to undo large positions that had been built up under the projections of a continued rise of European and US bond prices and a strengthening of the dollar against the yen and some European currencies. Although the increase in bond yields was undeniably large for such a short time period, the markets did receive new information in February and March on economic performance—especially on growth rates—and on the likely future course of macroeconomic policies.
Abstract
This paper provides information on private market financing for developing countries, covering developments since August 1992. Progress in dealing with bank debt problems has been based in large part on persistence in the pursuit of stabilization and reform programs. Such programs have resulted in strengthened external positions that have allowed debtor countries to accumulate reserves for use in debt-reduction operations. All of the countries where negotiations are now continuing had at some point suspended payments on medium- and long-term debt. Banks have recognized that resumption of regular (albeit partial) payments can be politically difficult in the absence of a quid pro quo. The group of middle-and lower-middle income countries with debt problems still to come to terms with bank creditors on debt-reduction packages is now limited. Many of these remaining countries (including Bulgaria, Ecuador, Panama, Peru, and Poland) have already begun negotiations with creditor banks.
Abstract
This paper discusses systematic issues in international finance explained in the International Capital Markets report. The paper describes that the nature and extent of recent banking problems in several industrial countries along with the policy responses to those problems. It is observed that balance sheet problems in banking are widespread among the major industrial countries. The paper also analyses recent activity in the European currency unit bond and exchange markets, and reviews developments in the private financing of developing countries and discusses several issues raised by the recent experience, including the broadening of the investor base for developing country securities, the special role played by regional financial centers in East and Southeast Asia, and the systemic implications of the evolving pattern of developing country financing. A key influence on international capital movements in recent years was the rising international diversification of investment portfolios, which is generally believed to have increased in response to the liberalization of exchange and capital controls in many industrial countries in the 1970s and 1980s.