From the time we are young, we fear the monster under the bed or in the closet, making it impossible to sleep without a nightlight. Then, we hear stories of Bigfoot, and maybe even the Mothman around campfires. When we are adults, we wonder if there might actually be supernatural creatures lurking in the shadows. Are these tall tales and urban legends only metaphors for what horrific things humanity is capable of-or do monsters exist? Go to some terrifying places with this cast of authors. You will be dragged into mystifying realities where demonic fairies hide, where devil monkeys lure carnival-goers to their demise, where Goatmen seek to destroy their prey, and where the goddess of death puts out a hit on victims of her choice. These shocking tales will have you biting your nails and locating that childhood nightlight. Because, in the end, we all know monsters do exist.
Pension reform is high on the agenda of many advanced and emerging market economies, for many reasons. First, public pensions often constitute a large share of government expenditure. Second, population aging means that reforms would be needed just to keep pension spending from rising in the future. Third, in many economies, low or falling pension coverage will leave large segments of the population without adequate income in old age and at risk of falling into poverty. Although a number of studies have assessed the effects of pension reforms on fiscal sustainability, a systematic analysis of equity issues in pension systems—and how countries have grappled with these issues—has yet to be undertaken. This book brings together the latest research on equity issues related to pension systems and pension reforms in the post-crisis world. Some of the key issues covered include: the effect of pension systems on intergenerational equity and the impact of pension reforms on poverty, the effects of pension reform measures on fiscal sustainability and equity, and the fiscal consequences of achieving different equity goals. It also presents country case studies. The volume provides a rich menu of material to assist policymakers and academic audiences seeking to understand the latest research in this area, as well as the lessons and challenges for the design of reforms.
Foreign exchange intervention is widely used as a policy tool, particularly in emerging markets, but many facets of this tool remain limited, especially in the context of flexible exchange rate regimes. The Latin American experience can be informative because some of its largest countries adopted floating exchange rate regimes and inflation targeting while continuing to intervene in foreign exchange markets. This edited volume reviews detailed accounts from several Latin American countries’ central banks, and it provides insight into how and with what aim many interventions were decided and implemented. This book documents the effectiveness of intervention and pays special attention to the role of foreign exchange intervention policy within inflation-targeting monetary frameworks. The main lesson from Latin America’s foreign exchange interventions, in the context of inflation targeting, is that the region has had a considerable degree of success. Transparency and a clear communication policy have been key. For economies that are not highly dollarized, rules-based intervention helped contain financial instability and build international reserves while preserving inflation targets. The Latin American experience can help other countries in the design and implementation of their policies.
This paper explores the role of exchange rates in emerging economies with inflation-targeting regimes, an issue that has become especially germane during the current episode of financial turmoil and volatile capital flows. Under inflation targeting, the interest rate is the main monetary policy tool for influencing activity and inflation, and there is little agreement about the appropriate role of the exchange rate.The exchange rate is a more important monetary policy tool for emerging economies that have adopted inflation targeting than it is for inflation-targeting advanced economies. Inflation-targeting emerging economies generally have less flexible exchange rate arrangements and intervene more frequently in the foreign exchange market than their advanced economy counterparts. The enhanced role of the exchange rate reflects these economies' greater vulnerability to exchange rate shocks and their less developed financial markets. However, their sharper focus on the exchange rate may cause some confusion about the commitment of their central banks to achieve the inflation target and may also complicate policy implementation. Global inflation pressures, greater exchange rate volatility, and the financial stresses from the global financial turmoil that began in mid-2007 are heightening these tensions.
This paper examines the international experience with full-fledged inflation targeting monetary regimes. Stylized facts are brought together from a review of the institutional elements of inflation targeting frameworks, a comparison of actual and targeted inflation outcomes, and case studies of large inflation target misses. Inflation targets are missed about 40 percent of the time and often by substantial amounts and for prolonged periods, yet no country has dropped inflation targeting. The resilience of the inflation targeting regime is attributable to the flexibility of the framework, its high standards of transparency and accountability, and the lack of realistic alternatives.
Staff Discussion Notes showcase the latest policy-related analysis and research being developed by individual IMF staff and are published to elicit comment and to further debate. These papers are generally brief and written in nontechnical language, and so are aimed at a broad audience interested in economic policy issues. This Web-only series replaced Staff Position Notes in January 2011.
Shortly after the end of World War II high-speed digital computing machines were being developed. It was clear that the mathematical aspects of com putation needed to be reexamined in order to make efficient use of high-speed digital computers for mathematical computations. Accordingly, under the leadership of Min a Rees, John Curtiss, and others, an Institute for Numerical Analysis was set up at the University of California at Los Angeles under the sponsorship of the National Bureau of Standards. A similar institute was formed at the National Bureau of Standards in Washington, D. C. In 1949 J. Barkeley Rosser became Director of the group at UCLA for a period of two years. During this period we organized a seminar on the study of solu tions of simultaneous linear equations and on the determination of eigen values. G. Forsythe, W. Karush, C. Lanczos, T. Motzkin, L. J. Paige, and others attended this seminar. We discovered, for example, that even Gaus sian elimination was not well understood from a machine point of view and that no effective machine oriented elimination algorithm had been developed. During this period Lanczos developed his three-term relationship and I had the good fortune of suggesting the method of conjugate gradients. We dis covered afterward that the basic ideas underlying the two procedures are essentially the same. The concept of conjugacy was not new to me. In a joint paper with G. D.
With growth slowing across much of the Latin America as a result of the end of the commodity supercycle and economic rebalancing in China, as well as fragmentation of the international banking system, policies to stimulate growth are needed. This book examines the financial landscapes of seven Latin American economies—Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Panama, Peru, and Uruguay—and makes a case for them to pursue regional financial integration. Chapters set out the benefits to the region of financial integration, the barriers to cross-border activity in banks, insurance companies, pension funds, and capital markets, as well as recommendations to address these barriers. Finally, the volume makes the case that regional integration now could be a step toward global integration in the short term.
Amongst the serried ranks of capitalists who drove European industrialisation in the nineteenth century, the Rothschilds were amongst the most dynamic and the most successful. Establishing businesses in Germany, Britain, France, Austria, and Italy the family soon became leading financiers, bankrolling a host of private and government businesses ventures. In so doing they played a major role in fuelling economic and industrial development across Europe, providing capital for major projects, particularly in the mining and railway sectors. Nowhere was this more apparent than in Spain, where for more than a century the House of Rothschild was one of the primary motors of Spanish economic development. Yet, despite the undoubted importance of the Rothschild's role, questions still remain regarding the actual impact of these financial activities and the effect they had on financial sectors, companies and Spanish markets. It is to such questions that this book turns its attention, utilising a host of archive sources in Britain, France and Spain to fully analyse the investments and financial activities carried out by the Rothschild House in Spain during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In so doing the book tackles a variety of interrelated issues: Firstly, fixing the period when the main capital entries sprung from the initiatives taken by the Rothschild family, how consequential they really were, and the sectors they affected. Secondly, quantifying the importance of these investments and financial activities and the weight they had on financial sectors, companies and Spanish markets, as well as in foreign investment in each period. Thirdly, outlining the steps followed and means used by the Rothschild House in order to achieve the success in each of their businesses. Finally, analysing the consequences of this phenomenon in the actual growth of Spanish contemporary economy, both in a general and in a partial scale. By exploring these crucial questions, not only do we learn much more about the working of one of the leading financial institutions and the development of the Spanish economy, but a greater understanding of the broader impact of international finance and the flow of capital in the nineteenth century is achieved.
Cross-border payments are expensive, slow, and opaque. These problems reflect multiple frictions, many of which boil down to limited trust among counterparties. Trust plays a central role in exchanging credit-based money. End users need to trust the issuers of money, and issuers must trust users to satisfy financial integrity requirements. Transactions are possible only where trust links exist. Interoperability between different forms of money can thus be conceptualized as the network of trusted links necessary for transactions. Traditionally, across borders, trust links involve exclusive bilateral credit relationships among correspondent banks. However, the fixed costs required to build these links foster an expensive and concentrated system. This paper interprets different payment arrangements in terms of the implied trust structures. It discusses how the tokenization of money alters trust links and allows for a potentially more efficient market structure to exchange money. The paper ends with a suggested global marketplace to trade tokenized money directly across borders.
Many emerging market economies have relied on foreign exchange intervention (FXI) in response to gross capital inflows. In this paper, we study whether FXI has been an effective tool to dampen the effects of these inflows on the exchange rate. To deal with endogeneity issues, we look at the response of different countries to plausibly exogenous gross inflows, and explore the cross country variation of FXI and exchange rate responses. Consistent with the portfolio balance channel, we find that larger FXI leads to less exchange rate appreciation in response to gross inflows.
This paper analyzes the effects of intervention on the level and volatility of the exchange rate in Mexico and Turkey, two emerging countries that have floating exchange rate regimes. The paper finds mixed evidence on the effectiveness of intervention. In Mexico, foreign exchange sales have a small impact on the exchange rate level and raise short-term volatility, while in Turkey, intervention does not appear to affect the exchange rate level but reduces its shortterm volatility. In both cases, the findings are consistent with officially stated policy objectives, which aim to minimize the effect of intervention on the exchange rate, but cast doubt on claims that intervention is a useful tool for smoothing volatility. Although these findings cannot be generalized to other emerging markets, intervention's apparently limited effectiveness highlights the need for central banks to use their scarce foreign reserves selectively and parsimoniously.
The provision of foreign exchange liquidity by emerging market central banks during the global shock of 2008-09 departs from the domestic liquidity lender of last resort role described by Bagehot in his classic "Lombard Street." This paper documents and analyzes the foreign exchange liquidity providing measures of the Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) in response to varied market stresses. These measures appear to have reduced the relative onshore cost of dollar liquidity on impact and seemed to stabilize market expectations of exchange rate volatility. The results suggest that foreign exchange liquidity easing operations may become a standard central bank tool.
This paper investigates empirically the pass-through of money market interest rates to retail banking interest rates in Chile, the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and five European countries. Overall, Chile's pass-through does not appear atypical. Based on a standard error-correction model, we find that, as in most countries considered, Chile's measured pass-through is incomplete. But Chile's pass-through is also faster than in many other countries considered and is comparable to that in the United States. While we find no significant evidence of asymmetry in Chile's pass-through across states of the interest rate or monetary policy cycle, we do find some evidence of parameter instability, around the time of the Asian and Russian crises. However, we do not find evidence that the switch to a more flexible exchange rate regime in 1999 and the "nominalization" of Chile's interest rate targets in 2001 have affected significantly the pass-through process.
This paper proposes a new taxonomy of monetary regimes defined by the choice and clarity of the nominal anchor. The regimes are as follows: (i) monetary nonautonomy, (ii) weak anchor, (iii) money anchor, (iv) exchange rate peg, (v) full-fledged inflation targeting, (vi) implicit price stability anchor, and (vii) inflation targeting lite. This taxonomy captures the commitment-discretion tradeoffs that lie at the heart of choosing a monetary regime. During the last 15 years the world has moved toward monetary regimes with less discretion. Empirical analysis suggests that country regime choices reflect the level of financial and economic development and recent inflation history.
Despite increasing exchange rate flexibility, central banks in emerging markets still intervene in their foreign exchange markets for several reasons. In doing so, they face many operational questions, including on the degree of transparency and the choice of markets and counterparties. This paper identifies elements of best practice in official foreign exchange intervention, presents survey evidence on intervention practices in developing countries, and assesses the effectiveness of intervention in Mexico and Turkey.
WORLD CUP FINALS (1930 – 2010) – A STATISTICAL SUMMARY, is a highly epitomized embodiment of the statistics on the WORLD CUP FINALS The information contained in this compendium are quite clear, factual, validated, authenticated and written in simple English blended completely with a soft sense for details and an admirable appetite for comparative analysis. Arranged in an easy to follow format, it is comprehensively loaded and garnished with deep soul-stirring information, to prove and add flavor, to accommodate varied reader interests. The compilation, which could be adjudged a detailed “Reference Book”, gives an in-depth knowledge to outsiders, insiders and to those who are neither fans nor players. It is simply chef-d’ouvre and truly and thoroughly represents the title, “World Cup Finals - a Statistical Summary” because of the highly enriched content of work. Many adherents of the beautiful game of football are rarely aware of the statistical information on the World Cup Finals, a very good attempt was made by the author and all these gaps were filled up in this compendium. It is a researchers’ delight and will be an inseparable companion to any soccer fan anywhere in the World.
This paper examines foreign exchange intervention practices and their effectiveness using a new qualitative and quantitative database for a panel of 15 economies covering 2004 - 10, with special focus on Latin America. Qualitatively, it examines institutional aspects such as declared motives, instruments employed, the use of rules versus discretion, and the degree of transparency. Quantitatively, it assesses the effectiveness of sterilized interventions in influencing the exchange rate using a two-stage IV-panel data approach to overcome endogeneity bias. Results suggest that interventions slow the pace of appreciation, but the effects decrease rapidly with the degree of capital account openness. At the same time, interventions are more effective in the context of already ?overvalued' exchange rates.
This book covers the history, botany and agricultural aspects of the crop, summarising the techniques that have been developed to improve harvesting, processing and packaging of olives. Full details are provided relating to the physico-chemical and microbiological aspects of processing of each of the olive types. It will serve as a practical guide to agricultural scientists, food scientists and technologists who are involved in the preparation of table olives.
This paper examines the reaction of the bilateral Ch$/US$ exchange rate to monetary policy actions in Chile and the United States. The approach is to regress the change in the exchange rate following a policy announcement on changes in market interest rates in response to the same announcement. U.S. monetary policy actions that raise the three-month treasury bill rate by 1 percentage point lead to depreciations of the Chilean peso by about 1.5 to 2 percent. The exchange rate also reacts to monetary policy actions in Chile, but the response appears to be smaller, and cannot be estimated with much precision on the available sample.
This book is a comprehensive guide to the diagnosis and treatment of blood and immunological disorders and cancer in foetuses and newborns. Divided into eight sections, the text begins with detailed discussion on foetal haematology, antenatal diagnosis of disorders, red blood cell disorders and anaemia in the newborn, and coagulation and platelet conditions. The following chapters cover foetal and neonatal malignancies and blood transfusion, followed by a final section on immunological disorders. Each topic explains new advances, all current treatment protocols, new drugs, and management approaches. Chapters are further enhanced by clinical images and tables. Key points Comprehensive guide to diagnosis and treatment of blood and immunological disorders and cancer in foetuses and newborns Presented in an easy to follow format, explaining new advances, treatment protocols, new drugs, and management approaches Includes discussion on neonatal malignancies and blood transfusion Highly illustrated with clinical images and tables
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