The paper compares trends in financial integration within Asia with those in industrialized countries and other regional groups. Declines in cross-country dispersion in equity returns and interest rates suggest increased Asian integration, with the process interrupted by crises and global...

The paper compares trends in financial integration within Asia with those in industrialized countries and other regional groups. Declines in cross-country dispersion in equity returns and interest rates suggest increased Asian integration, with the process interrupted by crises and global...

Analyzes the costs and benefits of full dollarization, or the adoption by one country of another country’s currency. Potential advantages include lower borrowing costs and deeper integration into world markets. But countries lose the ability to devalue, and become dependent on the U.S....

This paper analyzes global commodity trends and concludes that the marked decline in real commodity prices of the past decade should be regarded as largely permanent and irreversible. The authors contend that the analysis of commodity prices should be extended to include the role of the...

The debate on government debt in the context of possible reforms of the international financial architecture has thus far focused on crisis resolution. This paper seeks to broaden this debate. It asks how government debt could be structured to pursue other objectives, including crisis...

Analyzes the costs and benefits of full dollarization, or the adoption by one country of another country’s currency. Potential advantages include lower borrowing costs and deeper integration into world markets. But countries lose the ability to devalue, and become dependent on the U.S....

A consistent set of disaggregated industrial output data for four Eastern European countries is examined In order to determine the extent to which structural adjustment has taken place since the initiation of market-oriented reform. The latter created a massive relative price shock whose affects...

The “traditional structural approach” to the determination of real commodity prices has relied exclusively on demand factors as the fundamentals that explain the behavior of commodity prices. This framework, however, has been unable to explain the marked and sustained weakness in commodity...