The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is a major financial agency of the United Nations, and an international financial institution, headquartered in Washington, D.C., consisting of 190 countries. Its stated mission is "working to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability, facilitate international trade, promote high employment and sustainable economic growth, and reduce poverty around the world." Formed in 1944, started on 27 December 1945, at the Bretton Woods Conference primarily by the ideas of Harry Dexter White and John Maynard Keynes, it came into formal existence in 1945 with 29 member countries and the goal of reconstructing the international monetary system. It now plays a central role in the management of balance of payments difficulties and international financial crises. Countries contribute funds to a pool through a quota system from which countries experiencing balance of payments problems can borrow money. As of 2016, the fund had XDR 477 billion. The IMF is regarded as the global lender of last resort.
Special drawing rights are supplementary foreign exchange reserve assets defined and maintained by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). SDRs are units of account for the IMF, and not a currency per se. They represent a claim to currency held by IMF member countries for which they may be exchanged. SDRs were created in 1969 to supplement a shortfall of preferred foreign exchange reserve assets, namely gold and U.S. dollars. The ISO 4217 currency code for special drawing rights is XDR and the numeric code is 960.
The renminbi is the official currency of the People's Republic of China and one of the world's most traded currencies, ranking as the fifth most traded currency in the world as of April 2022.
A reserve currency is a foreign currency that is held in significant quantities by central banks or other monetary authorities as part of their foreign exchange reserves. The reserve currency can be used in international transactions, international investments and all aspects of the global economy. It is often considered a hard currency or safe-haven currency.
Currency substitution is the use of a foreign currency in parallel to or instead of a domestic currency. The process is also known as dollarization or euroization when the foreign currency is the dollar or the euro, respectively.
The global financial system is the worldwide framework of legal agreements, institutions, and both formal and informal economic actors that together facilitate international flows of financial capital for purposes of investment and trade financing. Since emerging in the late 19th century during the first modern wave of economic globalization, its evolution is marked by the establishment of central banks, multilateral treaties, and intergovernmental organizations aimed at improving the transparency, regulation, and effectiveness of international markets. In the late 1800s, world migration and communication technology facilitated unprecedented growth in international trade and investment. At the onset of World War I, trade contracted as foreign exchange markets became paralyzed by money market illiquidity. Countries sought to defend against external shocks with protectionist policies and trade virtually halted by 1933, worsening the effects of the global Great Depression until a series of reciprocal trade agreements slowly reduced tariffs worldwide. Efforts to revamp the international monetary system after World War II improved exchange rate stability, fostering record growth in global finance.
The Asian financial crisis was a period of financial crisis that gripped much of East Asia and Southeast Asia beginning in July 1997 and raised fears of a worldwide economic meltdown due to financial contagion. However, the recovery in 1998–1999 was rapid and worries of a meltdown subsided. The crisis started in Thailand on 2 July, with the financial collapse of the Thai baht after the Thai government was forced to float the baht due to lack of foreign currency to support its currency peg to the U.S. dollar. Capital flight ensued almost immediately, beginning an international chain reaction. At the time, Thailand had acquired a burden of foreign debt. As the crisis spread, most of Southeast Asia and later South Korea and Japan saw slumping currencies, devalued stock markets and other asset prices, and a precipitous rise in private debt.
In international economics, the balance of payments of a country is the difference between all money flowing into the country in a particular period of time and the outflow of money to the rest of the world. These financial transactions are made by individuals, firms and government bodies to compare receipts and payments arising out of trade of goods and services.
A country's gross government debt is the financial liabilities of the government sector. Changes in government debt over time reflect primarily borrowing due to past government deficits. A deficit occurs when a government's expenditures exceed revenues. Government debt may be owed to domestic residents, as well as to foreign residents. If owed to foreign residents, that quantity is included in the country's external debt.
International economics is concerned with the effects upon economic activity from international differences in productive resources and consumer preferences and the international institutions that affect them. It seeks to explain the patterns and consequences of transactions and interactions between the inhabitants of different countries, including trade, investment and transaction.
Raghuram Govind Rajan is an Indian economist and the Katherine Dusak Miller Distinguished Service Professor of Finance at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Between 2003 and 2006 he was Chief Economist and director of research at the International Monetary Fund. From September 2013 through September 2016 he was the 23rd Governor of the Reserve Bank of India; in 2015, during his tenure at the RBI, he became the Vice-Chairman of the Bank for International Settlements.
Capital controls are residency-based measures such as transaction taxes, other limits, or outright prohibitions that a nation's government can use to regulate flows from capital markets into and out of the country's capital account. These measures may be economy-wide, sector-specific, or industry specific. They may apply to all flows, or may differentiate by type or duration of the flow.
Brad W. Setser is an American economist and former staff economist at the United States Department of the Treasury. He worked at Roubini Global Economics Monitor ("RGE"), as Director of Global Research, where he co-authored the book "Bailouts or Bail-ins?" with Nouriel Roubini.
Renminbi currency value is a debate affecting the Chinese currency unit, the renminbi. The renminbi is classified as a fixed exchange rate currency "with reference to a basket of currencies", which has drawn attention from nations which have freely floated currency and has become a source of trade friction with Western nations.
The Currency War of 2009–2011 was an episode of competitive devaluation which became prominent in the financial press in September 2010. Competitive devaluation involves states competing with each other to achieve a relatively low valuation for their own currency, so as to assist their domestic industry. With the financial crises of 2008 the export sectors of many emerging economies have experienced declining orders, and from 2009 several states began or increased their levels of intervention to push down their currencies.
Consensus Economics is a global macroeconomic survey firm that polls more than 700 economists monthly for their forecasts for over 2000 macroeconomic indicators in 115 countries. The company is headquartered in London, United Kingdom.
Ronald Ian McKinnon was an applied economist. His primary interests were international economics and economic development, with strong secondary interests in transitional economies and fiscal federalism. Understanding financial institutions in general, and monetary institutions in particular, was central to his teaching and research, with interests ranging from the proper regulation of banks and financial markets in poorer countries to the historical evolution of global and regional monetary systems in the context of the world dollar standard.
The Chinese stock market turbulence began with the popping of the stock market bubble on 12 June 2015 and ended in early February 2016. A third of the value of A-shares on the Shanghai Stock Exchange was lost within one month of the event. Major aftershocks occurred around 27 July and 24 August's "Black Monday". By 8–9 July 2015, the Shanghai stock market had fallen 30 percent over three weeks as 1,400 companies, or more than half listed, filed for a trading halt in an attempt to prevent further losses. Values of Chinese stock markets continued to drop despite efforts by the government to reduce the fall. After three stable weeks the Shanghai index fell again on 24 August by 8.48 percent, marking the largest fall since 2007.
Wang Tao is a Chinese economist and expert on the Chinese economy. She is currently managing director, chief China economist and head of Asia economic research at UBS Investment Bank. She served on the Mainland Opportunities Committee of the Hong Kong Financial Services Development Council from 2016 to 2021, and is a member of the Chief China Economist Forum.
Digital renminbi, or Digital Currency Electronic Payment, is a central bank digital currency issued by China's central bank, the People's Bank of China. It is the first digital currency to be issued by a major economy, undergoing public testing as of April 2021. The digital RMB is legal tender and has equivalent value with other forms of renminbi, also known as the Chinese yuan (CNY), such as bills and coins.
