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Before 2007, economists thought that financial crises would never happen again in the United States, that such upheavals were a thing of the past. Gary B. Gorton, a prominent expert on financial crises, argues that economists fundamentally misunderstand what they are, why they occur, and why there were none in the U.S. from 1934 to 2007. Misunderstanding Financial Crises offers a back-to-basics overview of financial crises, and shows that they are not rare, idiosyncratic events caused by a perfect storm of unconnected factors. Instead, Gorton shows how financial crises are, indeed, inherent to our financial system. Economists, Gorton writes, looked from a certain point of view and missed eve...
Here leading world economic experts examine topical issues of international finance such as globalization, multilateral financial institutions and capital flows to emerging economies. Ideal for students, businesspeople and policy makers.
How is finance related to economic processes, and why should it be viewed as a public good requiring policy action? This book provides an answer. The book develops a practical framework for safeguarding financial stability, which encompasses both prevention and resolution of problems. It also examines on-going and future challenges to financial stability posed by globalization, a growing reliance on derivatives and their markets, and the capital market activities of insurers and reinsurers.
The lingering effects of the economic crisis are still visible—this shows a clear need to improve our understanding of financial crises. This book surveys a wide range of crises, including banking, balance of payments, and sovereign debt crises. It begins with an overview of the various types of crises and introduces a comprehensive database of crises. Broad lessons on crisis prevention and management, as well as the short-term economic effects of crises, recessions, and recoveries, are discussed.
Technological developments in electronic finance have changed the nature and delivery of financial services in recent years, especially through the use of online banking, online trading and brokerage services. This report reviews the developments in e-finance and analyses the implications for consumers, financial service providers and governments. Issues discussed include: the impact on competition within the financial services industry; how financial sector policies in emerging markets are affected; public policy and regulatory requirements.
Economic volatility has come into its own after being treated for decades as a secondary phenomenon in the business cycle literature. This evolution has been driven by the recognition that non-linearities, long buried by the economist's penchant for linearity, magnify the negative effects of volatility on long-run growth and inequality, especially in poor countries. This collection organizes empirical and policy results for economists and development policy practitioners into four parts: basic features, including the impact of volatility on growth and poverty; commodity price volatility; the financial sector's dual role as an absorber and amplifier of shocks; and the management and prevention of macroeconomic crises. The latter section includes a cross-country study, case studies on Argentina and Russia, and lessons from the debt default episodes of the 1980s and 1990s.
We collect new data to assess the importance of supply-side credit market frictions by studying the impact of financial sector recapitalization packages on the growth performance of firms in a large cross-section of 50 countries during the recent crisis. We develop an identification strategy that uses the financial crisis as a shock to credit supply and exploits exogenous variation in the degree to which firms depend on external financing for investment needs, and focus on policy interventions aimed at alleviating the bank capital crunch. We find that the growth of firms dependent on external financing is disproportionately positively affected by bank recapitalization policies, and that this effect is quantitatively important and robust to controlling for other financial sector support policies. We also find that fiscal policy disproportionately boosted growth of firms more dependent on external financing. These results provide new evidence of a quantitatively important role of credit market frictions in influencing real economic activity.
The understanding of the economic and legal structure of the institutions of bankruptcy has increased considerably over the past decade. This publication describes the state of current knowledge. Containing both theoretical studies and evidence from recent case studies, it shows the possibilities and methods of legal reform and the pitfalls of misguided political action.
Explicit deposit insurance (DI) is widely held to be a crucial element of modern financial safety nets. This book draws on an original cross-country dataset on DI systems and design features to examine the impact of DI on banking behavior and assess the policy complications that emerge in developing countries.