The special drawing right (SDR), issued by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), has the potential to strengthen dramatically the international monetary system. Established in 1969 and allocated twice during its first decade, the SDR was in the institutional closet from 1980 until 2009, when...

This Guidance Note outlines good practices on information-sharing across key areas in which the Bank and the IMF interact. The note outlines general principles consistent with these frameworks and discusses how the staffs of the two institutions are expected to exchange information related to...

Most of the literature on the interventions of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Portugal points to the June 1978 Stand-by arrangement (SBA) between the Portuguese authorities and the IMF as being the first such intervention (Nunes, 2010, Lopes, 1982 and 1996, Pinto, 1983, Schmitt, 1981,...

Lebanon has been passing through considerable difficulties as a result of compounded economic and financial degradation. Therefore, a comprehensive adjustment program is necessary. The aim of this research is to describe different reform plans applied by countries that have undergone economic...

The relationship between the Bretton Woods institutions and Africa began in the 1980s as a result of the international debt crisis which affected the African continent negatively. The African continent approached the Bretton Woods institutions to salvage its economic situation. Consequently, the...

The Great Depression and the Dust Bowl of the 1930s presented unprecedented problems for Canadians in general, and farmers specifically. The severe financial hardship faced by prairie farmers ultimately led to the enactment of a novel farm insolvency statute – the most progressive statute of...

The global financial crisis of 2007–2008 might constitute another structural change in IMF lending after the Latin American debt crisis and the end of the Cold War. Using a panel dataset of 120 countries with IMF programmes from 1993 to 2016, I find that with the crisis, the importance of...

The 36-month exceptional access Stand-By Arrangement (SBA) with the Republic of Argentina approved by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in June 2018, later augmented in October 2018, represents the largest programme in the history of the Fund. The programme, however, has failed in all its...

This paper examines whether IMF lending is associated with increases in outflows to offshore financial centers (OFCs), known for bank secrecy and asset protection, relative to other international destinations. Using quarterly data from the BIS on bilateral bank deposits, we are unable to detect...