It has come to this. Does anyone remember Nicolas Sarkozy of a year ago? Back then he was being feted by the anglospheric media as a French Thatcher, a neoliberal wind of change shaking a battery of outdated perceptions to its heart and mixing a few other metaphors whilst they were at it. We blogged [...]

From the growing list of countries in discussions with the IMF for a crisis loan program, Iceland has made the first concrete move.  As explained in today’s statement from the Fund, there is an agreement between the staff mission and the government on a huge $2.1 billion loan (huge relative to Iceland’s size) in return [...]

Hungarian Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsány announced yesterday (Wednesday) that the government had reached an agreement with commercial banks intended to protect the interests of those who have taken out foreign currency loans.
The agreement, which is expected to be signed early next week, has three key components:
1) At the request of the debtor the banks will [...]

IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn yesterday –
The Pakistani authorities have requested discussions with the IMF on an economic program supported by financial assistance from the Fund to meet the balance of payments difficulties the country is experiencing as a result of high food and fuel prices and the global financial crisis … The amount of [...]

White House announcement today –
Today, the President is inviting the leaders of the Group of 20 countries to a summit in the Washington, D.C. area, on November 15 to discuss financial markets and the global economy. The G-20 finance process, which includes key developed and emerging market countries, was established in 1999, after the last [...]

The Board of the International Monetary Fund has issued a seemingly matter-of-fact statement concerning the status of the Fund’s investigation of its Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn and allegations of abuse of power in a relationship with a subordinate.  The purpose of the statement seems to be to address an inference that might be drawn from [...]

Après Moi Le Deluge
The condition of Spain’s economy is now deteriorating markedly and rapidly by the month. The recent bout of extreme financial turmoil is only likely to make things even worse in this regard. Output is down, domestic demand is down, exports are struggling, and unemployment is up. The tumultuous events of late August [...]

Edward has been keeping you all up to date on the resurgence of calls to the IMF fire extinguisher due to the global banking crisis, and the Fund has no doubt welcomed the renewed interest in its present and future functions.  But in an unfortunate weekend news dump, it’s been revealed that IMF Managing Director [...]

Hungary’s agony has continued during the week with both currency and stock markets falling sharply while bankers continue to report acute credit shortages. At the same time contagion has started to extend its ugly reach right across eastern Europe, with Ukraine, the Baltics and Serbia (at a minimum) all in ongoing negotiations with the IMF, [...]

Iceland Chamber of Commerce working paper May 2006, “FINANCIAL STABILITY IN ICELAND” by FREDERIC S. MISHKIN & TRYGGVI T. HERBERTSSON –
There are concerns that the banks could experience refinancing problems. Although the banks’ reliance on external financing poses the biggest risk to the financial system right now, the probability of a credit event occurring is [...]