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Carol C. Bertaut
,
Stephanie E. Curcuru
,
Ester Faia
, and
Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas
We provide new estimates of the return on US external claims and liabilities using confidential, high-quality, security-level data. The excess return is positive on average, since claims are tilted toward higher return equities. The excess return is large and positive in normal times but large and negative during global crises, reflecting the global insurance role of the US external balance sheet. Controlling for issuer’s nationality, we find that US investors have a larger exposure to equity issued by Asia-headquartered corporations than reported in the aggregate statistics. Finally, equity portfolios are concentrated in ’superstar’ firms, but for US liabilities foreign holdings are less concentrated than the overall market.
International Monetary Fund. Statistics Dept.
A CARTAC National Accounts technical assistance mission to St Kitts and Nevis, re-referenced the volume estimates of quarterly GDP for the years 2012–2022 using 2018 as the base and reference year from the previous 2006 base year. The series were developed for both Saint Kitts and for Nevis and a combined series for the Federal aggregate. The re-referencing exercise provided an opportunity to introduce some other improvements. Notably, the calculation of Final Intermediation Services Indirectly Measured (FISIM) consumed by each economic sector businesses and its allocation to economic activities. The updated series were also prepared using the International Standard Industrial Classification of Economic Activity (ISIC) revision 4 . These improvements align the updated GDP series with the standards set out in the 2008 System of National Accounts. In addition, the current price estimates of GDP by expenditure were also reviewed.
International Monetary Fund. Statistics Dept.
A technical assistance (TA) mission on external sector statistics (ESS) was conducted to the Central Statistics Office (CSO) of Saint Lucia as part of the Caribbean Regional Technical Assistance Centre (CARTAC) work program on ESS. The mission focused on addressing data compilation issues on trade in goods—especially on the import and re-export of fuel—and travel credits and assessed the revised 2022 balance of payments that was disseminated in December 2023.
International Monetary Fund. Legal Dept.
This paper summarizes the anti-money laundering/combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) measures in place in the Virgin Islands (VI). The overall understanding of ML and TF risks in the VI is fair and narrow, particularly with respect to the design of VI legal persons and legal arrangements, and their misuse abroad. All banks and some legal practitioners demonstrated a good understanding of their ML risks and AML/CFT obligations. The VI generally provides mutual legal assistance within a reasonable timeframe and its quality is generally good. While competent authorities were able to demonstrate their ability to furnish basic and beneficial ownership information in a timely manner in the context of international cooperation requests they do not proactively seek international cooperation, and the VI has not investigated or prosecuted any cases of misuse of legal persons and arrangements. The law should be amended to provide for the full range of powers to carry out financial and complex investigations as well as effective, proportionate, and dissuasive sanctions for ML, whether such ML relates to drug offences or other crimes.
International Monetary Fund. Statistics Dept.
This paper presents the technical assistance report on remote national accounts mission in St. Lucia. The improved estimates will improve the understanding of the Saint Lucia economy, notably the needs of the Ministry of Finance for more robust and timely national accounts statistics. This development will also help Saint Lucia meet the IMF Special Data Dissemination Standards requirements. Training has been provided on the different components of Gross Domestic Product by expenditure (GDP-E) for current price methods and price and volume measurement. The mission identified some research topics for the national accounts department as part of its development of GDP-E. This includes checking the quality of some indicators and identifying whether some sources are available at a lower level of detail. The mission also quality assured the current methods used for compiling accommodation in the production measure of GDP. In order to support progress toward the objectives, the mission recommended priority recommendations to make headway in improving Saint Lucia’s national accounts.
International Monetary Fund. Western Hemisphere Dept.
This technical assistance report on St. Kitts and Nevis highlights strengthening core business functions audit capacity (RTAT). In response to a request from the St. Kitts and Nevis Inland Revenue Division (IRD), Caribbean Regional Technical Assistance Centre provided capacity development (CD) in strengthening audit capacity under the RTAT training program. The main objective of this CD was to strengthen capacity to audit and verify accuracy of reporting by taxpayers in the Financial Sector. The CD started with the provision of five days of training of IRD auditors where the purpose was to prepare the authorities to implement the necessary actions in adopting good practice in auditing the Financial Sector. The IRD will build on this training and CD when designing future audit program. Given the importance of Financial Sector in St. Kitts and Nevis, further support to ensure compliance in the sector would be beneficial. The IRD will need further assistance to strengthen the audit program of the Financial Sector and support to review of tax returns of the companies in that sector. As a first step the audit team should, develop a program of profile meetings to gather relevant information on the operations of various businesses in the sector.