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Reassessing the Role of State-Owned Enterprises in Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe
The Central, Eastern, and South Eastern European (CESEE) region is ripe for a reassessment of the role of the state in economic activity. The rapid income convergence with Western Europe of the early 2000s was not always equally shared across society, and it has now slowed dramatically in many countries of the region.
Kingdom of the Netherlands—Netherlands
This paper aims to contribute to the discussion by sketching ways in which the taxation equity-efficiency frontier could be shifted outward in the Netherlands. In a nutshell, we argue that significant efficiency gains could be achieved by shifting the tax burden away from labor, and toward consumption and capital—especially housing. The detrimental impact of the tax-benefit system on labor supply—in particular by mothers—and the insufficient and distortionary use of the value-added tax (VAT) as a revenue-collection mechanism is also highlighted in the paper. This paper also reviews the main features of the Dutch tax system and sketches the contours of a hypothetical tax reform.
Dominant Currencies and External Adjustment
The extensive use of the US dollar when firms set prices for international trade (dubbed dominant currency pricing) and in their funding (dominant currency financing) has come to the forefront of policy debate, raising questions about how exchange rates work and the benefits of exchange rate flexibility. This Staff Discussion Note documents these features of international trade and finance and explores their implications for how exchange rates can help external rebalancing and buffer macroeconomic shocks.
Determinants and Effects of Countries’ External Capital Structure: A Firm-Level Analysis
In this paper, we investigate whether a firm’s composition of foreign liabilities matters for their resilience during economic turmoil and examine which characteristics determine a firm’s foreign capital structure. Using firm-level data, we corroborate previous findings from the (international) macroeconomic literature that the composition of foreign liabilities matters for a country’s susceptibility to external shocks. We find that firms with a positive equity share in their foreign liabilities were less affected by the global financial crisis and also less likely to default in the aftermath of the crisis. In addition, we show that larger, more open, and more productive firms tend to have a higher equity share in total foreign liabilities.
Austria: Selected Issues
Selected Issues
Luxembourg
This Selected Issues paper provides an overview of the impact of monetary policy on Luxembourg’s macroeconomy. It analyzes the impact on the banking system, including risks that could result from normalization. It also studies the impact of accommodative monetary policy on the investment fund industry. Accommodative monetary policy has contributed to the performance of the Luxembourg economy through some expansion of aggregate demand and through its impact on the financial system. Banks have remained profitable and interest margins stable, while fee and commission income from the fund and other activity has been healthy. The investment fund industry has benefited from various factors such as portfolio rebalancing, search for yield, and other market developments leading to strong inflows into various classes of investment funds, and through strong valuation effects. Scenario analysis suggests that the fund industry could be adversely impacted by sharp interest rate increases and that, because of interconnections, the banking system would also be affected.
IMF Staff Papers, Volume 50, Special Issue, IMF Third Annual Research Conference
The paper discusses a model in which growth is a negative function of fiscal burden. Moreover, growth discontinuously switches from high to low as the fiscal burden reaches a critical level. The paper provides an overview of key elements of corporate bankruptcy codes and practice around the world that are relevant to the debate on sovereign debt restructuring. It also describes the broad trends in international financial integration for a sample of industrial countries and explains the cross-country and time-series variation in the size of international balance sheets.
Basel III and Bank-Lending: Evidence from the United States and Europe
Using data on commercial banks in the United States and Europe, this paper analyses the impact of the new Basel III capital and liquidity regulation on bank-lending following the 2008 financial crisis. We find that U.S. banks reinforce their risk absorption capacities when expanding their credit activities. Capital ratios have significant, negative impacts on bank-retail-and-other-lending-growth for large European banks in the context of deleveraging and the “credit crunch” in Europe over the post-2008 financial crisis period. Additionally, liquidity indicators have positive but perverse effects on bank-lending-growth, which supports the need to consider heterogeneous banks’ characteristics and behaviors when implementing new regulatory policies.
Experiences with Macroprudential Policy—Five Case Studies
This paper presents case studies of macroprudential policy in five jurisdictions (Hong Kong SAR, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Singapore, and Sweden). The case studies describe the institutional framework, its evolution, the use of macroprudential tools, and the circumstances under which the tools have been used. The paper shows how macroprudential policy is conducted under a heterogeneous set of institutional frameworks. In all cases macroprudential tools have been used to address risks in the housing market. In addition, some of them have moved to enhance the resilience of their banks to more general cyclical and structural risks.
Managing Fiscal Risks from National Airlines in Pacific Island Countries
Pacific island countries (PICs) rely on national airlines for connectivity, trade, and tourism. These airlines are being struck hard by COVID-19. Losses will weigh on public sector balance sheets and pose risks to economic recovery. With a backdrop of tight fiscal space and increasing government debt, losses in airlines are adding to fiscal risks in some PICs. This paper discusses tools to evaluate and manage the fiscal risks from national airlines in the Pacific. We present a snapshot of the current state of Public Financial Management (PFM) practices in PICs and detail the best practices. This exercise would illustrate the areas in which PICs have scope to improve their risk management with regard to national airlines. We then discuss the use of diagnostic tools and capacity development to enhance monitoring and risk management. Greater transparency and accountability in the airlines, combined with rigorous oversight, would be the first step towards improved financial management of national airlines.
