The paper examines interest rates in nine Latin American and East Asian countries during the period 1987-1994. The goal is to discover why interest rates have remained high, failing to converge to U.S. levels, despite capital market liberalization and a resurgence of portfolio capital inflows...

This paper uses non-parametric tests to provide a description of the "stylized facts" associated with episodes of speculative pressure in foreign exchange markets in Pacific Basin Economies, and to see whether these "stylized facts" appear to be broadly consistent with the alternative...

Early studies have shown that an exchange rate policy which attempts to stimulate exports through aggressive devaluations is often found to be inflationary. This study tests the validity of this hypothesis for the specific case of Indonesia. To analyze the possible inflationary consequence of...

This paper analyzes the role of money, credit, trade and competitiveness variables in signaling currency crises in a sample of East Asian and Latin American countries over the period 1972:01 - 1997:10. Bivariate tests suggest that money and credit, as well as trade and competitiveness variables,...

Disclosure is widely regarded as a necessary condition for market discipline in a modern financial sector. However, the determinants of disclosure decisions are still unknown, particularly among banks. This paper investigates the determinants of disclosure by Japanese Shinkin banks in 1996 and...

The coincidence of banking and currency crises associated with the Asian financial crisis has drawn renewed attention to causal and common factors linking the two phenomena. In this paper, we analyze the incidence and underlying causes of banking and currency crises in 90 industrial and...

Following the 1997-1998 financial turmoil, crisis countries in Asia moved toward either floating or fixed exchange rate systems, superficially consistent with the bipolar view of exchange rate regimes and the "hollow middle" hypothesis. But some observers have claimed that, despite the changes...