When the spectacular devaluation of the peso occurred at the end of 1994, 91-day swap lines of credit of $3 billion each-dollars for pesos-were available to the Bank of Mexico at the Federal Reserve and the Treasury's Exchange Stabilization Fund (ESF). These were known as regular swap lines. The...

Quarterly reports on Treasury and Federal Reserve foreign exchange operations ending three months earlier than the date of publication in the Federal Reserve Bulletin are available through October 1992 (issues of April, July, October 1992, and January 1993). These reports provide information on...

In 2000, in 20 buyback operations, the Treasury purchased a total of $30 billion of par value marketable debt that it had previously issued, with maturities ranging from 12 to 27 years. In each of the first two quarters of 2001, it will purchase, in two buyback operations per month, about $9...

In a luncheon speech at the AEA meeting on January 3, 1999, Stanley Fischer argued the case, in a reformed international financial system for ?an agency that will act as lender of last resort for countries facing a crisis.? He asserts that there is a need for such an agency and ?that the IMF is...

Having lost its Bretton Woods role as a regulator of exchange rates and source of short-term balance-of-payments assistance, the IMF has since been an organization in search of a reason for it to exist. Had it been content to serve its members by keeping records of their monetary and economic...