Crises on external sovereign debt are typically defined as defaults. Such a definition accurately captures debt-servicing difficulties in the 1980s, a period of numerous defaults on bank loans. However, defining defaults as debt crises is problematic for the 1990s, when sovereign bond markets...

Purpose – The most popular form of Islamic finance is commonly referred to as sukuk – wholesale, asset-based capital market securities. The purpose of this paper is to enhance the general understanding of essential policy considerations in the creation and development of sukuk markets....

This paper proposes four tools to strengthen financial integration in sub-Saharan Africa. The first tool, “political commitment devices” can ensure steady progress on the road to an economic community. For instance, stronger regional institutions can monitor progress towards integration and...

This paper proposes four tools to strengthen financial integration in sub-Saharan Africa. The first tool, “political commitment devices” can ensure steady progress on the road to an economic community. For instance, stronger regional institutions can monitor progress towards integration and...

This paper examines the spillover effects of sovereign rating news on European financial markets during the period 2007-2010. Our main finding is that sovereign rating downgrades have statistically and economically significant spillover effects both across countries and financial markets. The...

Three explanations have been suggested for the moderation in real GDP and inflation that has occurred in industrialized countries since the 1980s: good luck, better monetary policy, and structural changes in the economy. Recent research finds that better monetary policy explains most of the...

An exogenous oil price shock raises inflation and contracts output, similar to a negative productivity shock. In the standard New Keynesian model, however, this does not generate any trade-off between inflation and output gap volatility: under a strict inflation-targeting policy, the output...

We assess the extent to which the period of great U.S. macroeconomic stability since the mid-1980s can be accounted for by changes in oil shocks and the oil share in GDP. To do this we estimate a DSGE model with an oil-producing sector before and after 1984 and perform counterfactual...