International Currency Review

This paper reviews the Fund’s policy on multiple currency practices (MCPs). There remain strong economic and legal reasons to retain a policy on MCPs. The over-arching aim of the review is to make the policy and its application more effective. Based on this review, the paper proposes initial considerations for reforming features of the policy that have created challenges. • Clarifying the concept of “official action” to focus on measures that segment FX markets. • Eliminating potentiality. • Updating the threshold for permissible FX spreads. • Adjusting approval policies. • Reviewing links with capital transactions. • Considering merits of a remedial framework.

An accessible guide to trading the fast-moving foreign exchange market The foreign exchange market, or forex, was once dominated by global banks, hedge funds, and multinational corporations, but that has all changed with Internet technology and the advent of online forex brokers. Now, hundreds of thousands of traders and investors around the world can participate in this profitable field. Written by forex expert Kathy Lien, The Little Book of Currency Trading will show you how to effectively invest and trade in today's biggest market. Page by page, she describes the multitude of opportunities possible in the forex market, from short-term price swings to long-term trends, and details practical products that can help you achieve success, such as currency-based ETFs. Explains the forces that drive currencies and provides strategies to profit from them Reveals how you can use various currencies to reduce risk and take advantage of global trends Examines financial vehicles that can help you make money without having to monitor the market every day The Little Book of Currency Trading opens the world of currency trading and investing to anyone interested in entering this dynamic arena.

Issues in debates about foreign currency exposure—the denomination of liabilities or assets in foreign currency. The foreign currency denomination of contracts in international transactions can lead to international currency exposure at the country level with important economic and policy implications. When debts are denominated in foreign currency and revenues in domestic currency, exchange rate fluctuations can result in balance sheet effects for countries with either net asset or liability positions. Moreover, currency mismatch between assets and liabilities can be a cause for crises in developing and emerging economies. This book looks at the issues surrounding foreign currency exposure in today's increasingly integrated world economy. The contributors draw on cross-country as well as country-specific data. They consider international currency risk after the Swiss franc ended its one-sided peg with the euro, for example, and the foreign exchange positions of firms in Turkey and Russia. Other contributors take macroeconomic perspectives, examining the potential effects of exchange rate realignment, the pressure to appreciate on countries with current account surpluses, and the currency exposure in international trade. Finally, contributors consider the issue from finance and political economy perspectives, addressing the phenomenon of the forward premium puzzle and discussing geopolitical aspects ascending currencies. Contributors Fatih Altunok, Huseyin Aytug, Agustín S. Bénétrix, Jörg Breitung, Paul De Grauwe, Eiji Fujii, Peter Garber, Juann H. Hung, Signe Krogstrup, Philip R. Lane, Katja Mann, Arif Oduncu, Gunther Schnabl, Maria V. Sokolova, Cédric Tille

A powerful new understanding of global currency trends, including the rise of the Chinese yuan At first glance, the history of the modern global economy seems to support the long-held view that the currency of the world’s leading power invariably dominates international trade and finance. But in How Global Currencies Work, three noted economists overturn this conventional wisdom. Offering a new history of global finance over the past two centuries and marshaling extensive new data to test current theories of how global currencies work, the authors show that several national monies can share international currency status—and that their importance can change rapidly. They demonstrate how changes in technology and international trade and finance have reshaped the landscape of international currencies so that several international financial standards can coexist. In fact, they show that multiple international and reserve currencies have coexisted in the past—upending the traditional view of the British pound’s dominance before 1945 and the U.S. dollar’s postwar dominance. Looking forward, the book tackles the implications of this new framework for major questions facing the future of the international monetary system, including how increased currency competition might affect global financial stability.

One World Currency presents a serious study about the need for a single stable currency with timely, historical references and skillful economic analysis by noted economist José Rafael Abinader. This book describes how a global and universally accepted currency will lead to economic stability throughout the world as well as the means for the design, implementation, and administration for such a currency. In order to support his proposal, Abinader examines the competition between the so-called main world currencies, the U.S. dollar and the Euro, how competition leads to instability in developed and developing nations.

In this analysis, Shelton calls for a unified international monetary regime—a new Bretton Woods—to lay the foundation for worldwide stability and prosperity in the post-Cold War era. Despite worldwide rhetoric about free trade and the global economy, the leading economic powers have done little to address the most insidious form of protectionism—the inherently unstable international monetary system. In outlining steps toward a new world monetary structure, Judy Shelton elevates the needs of individual producers—who actually create wealth in the global economy—over the programmes of governments.