Abstract: This paper applies a two stage estimation procedure that accounts for a sample-selection bias and firm-level heterogeneity in order to estimate a gravity model of exports at industry level of aggregation for 119 exporting countries and 142 importing countries in 2002-2006. It further...

Informal payments in the health sector in Eastern Europe and Central Asia are emerging as a fundamental aspect of health care financing and a serious impediment to health care reform. Informal payments are payments to individuals or institutions in cash or in kind made outside official payment...

This paper focuses on the measurement of a contemporaneous currency crisis. The analysis covers 14 "emerging" or "transforming" economies that experienced episodes of currency crises over the last decade. It adds to well-known examples relatively littleknown evidence on the crisis depth in some...

At the beginning of 1990s the Soviet successor states started to transform their financial sectors to meet the needs of the emerging market economies. Following a decade of transition, results differ.Although the Baltic States were able to build quite successful financial systems, in the CIS...

The paper analyses possible consequences of the EU enlargement on the EU - CIS-7 trade. It considers current situation in trade between two country groups, describes the factors limiting this trade, and discusses the opportunities for the trade associated with the EU accession of the Central and...

In the 1990s, the CIS region experienced a painful transformation following the collapse of the USSR and the command economy. For the less developed republics of the former USSR, this process was even more dramatic as they lost subsidies from the Union's budget and some of them suffered...

We investigate the likely sources of exchange rate dynamics in selected CIS countries (Russia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan, and Moldova) over the past decade (1999-2008). The analysis is based on country VAR models augmented by a regional common factor structure (FAVAR model)....