Front Matter Page
IMFstaffpapers
Robert Flood
Editor and Committee Chair
Ratna Sahay and Eswar S. Prasad
Co-Editor
Helen Chin
Assistant Editor
Stefan Hubrich
Research Assistant
Sheila Kinsella
Administrative Coordinator
Editorial Committee
Brian Aitken
Tamim Bayoumi
Sharmini Coorey
Tito Cordelia
Liam Ebrill
Atish R. Ghosh
Laura Kodres
Donald J. Mathieson
Sunil Sharma
The objective of IMF Staff Papers is to publish high quality research produced by IMF staff and invited guests on a variety of topics of interest to a broad audience including academics and policymakers in the member countries of the Fund. The papers selected for publication in the journal are subject to an extensive review process using both internal and external referees. IMF Staff Papers also welcomes outside comments, criticisms, and interesting replications of published work. The views presented in published papers are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the position ot the Executive Board or of the IMF.
Subscription: $U.S.54.00 a volume or the approximate equivalent in the currencies of most countries. Three issue constitute a volume. Single copies may be purchased at $18. Individual academic rate to full-time professors and students of universities and colleges: $27 a volume. Subscriptions and orders should be sent to:
International Monetary Fund
Publication Services
700 19th Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20431, U.S.A.
Telephone: (202) 623-7430
Fax: (202) 623-7201
E-mail: publications@Imf.org
Internet: http://www.imf.org
Front Matter Page
EDITOR’S NOTE
The Editor invites from contributors outside the IMF brief comments (not more than 1,000 words) on published articles in IMF Staff Papers. These comments should be addressed to the Editor, who will forward them to the author of the original article for reply. Both the comments and the reply will be considered for publication.
The data underlying articles published in IMF Staff Papers are available on the journal’s website (http://www.imf.org/staffpapers). Readers are invited to use these data to expand on the material in the articles, and the journal will consider publishing such work.
Front Matter Page
© 2000 by the International Monetary Fund
International Standard Serial Number: ISSN 1020-7635
This serial publication is catalogued as follows:
International Monetary Fund
IMF staff papers—International Monetary Fund. v. 1- Feb. 1950–
[Washington] International Monetary Fund.
v. tables, diagrs. 26 cm.
Three no. a year, 1950-1977; four no. a year, 1978–
Indexes:
Vols. 1-27, 1950-80, 1 v.
ISSN 1020-7635 = IMF staff papers—International Monetary Fund.
1. Foreign exchange—Periodicals. 2. Commerce—Periodicals.
3. Currency question—Periodicals.
HG3810.15 332.082 53-35483
Contents
Portfolio Diversification, Leverage, and Financial Contagion
Garry J. Schinasi and R. Todd Smith
How Persistent Are Shocks to World Commodity Prices?
Paul Cashin, Hong Liang, and C. John McDermott
Ratchet Effects in Currency Substitution: An Application to the Kyrgyz Republic
Joannes Mongardini and Johannes Mueller
Safety from Currency Crashes
Kent Osband and Caroline Van Rijckeghem
Japan’s Stagnant Nineties: A Vector Autoregression Retrospective
Ramana Ramaswamy and Christel Rendu