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21. Financial Sector Structure and Financial Crisis Burden: A Model Based on the Russian Default of 1998

Author:
George Mavrotas and Dmitri Vinogradov
Publication Date:
06-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
We consider an overlapping generations model with two production factors and two types of agents in the presence of financial intermediation and its application to the Russian default of August 1998. The paper focuses on the analysis of the consequences of a sudden negative repayments shock on financial intermediation capacity and consequently on the economy as a whole. The model exhibits a 'chain reaction' property, when a single macroeconomic shock can lead to the exhaustion of credit resources and to the subsequent collapse of the whole banking system. To maintain the capability of the system to recover, regulatory intervention is needed even in the presence of the state guarantees on agents' deposits in the banks (workout incentives). We compare the results for an intermediated economy with those derived under the assumption of a market economy, and draw some broad conclusions on the consequences of the crises, which are contingent on the financial sector structure.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Emerging Markets, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
Russia

22. The Putin Restoration

Author:
Leon Aron
Publication Date:
03-2004
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research
Abstract:
The Revolution had, indeed, two distinct phases: one in which the sole aim of the French nation seemed to be to make a clean sweep of the past; and a second, in which attempts were made to salvage fragments from the wreckage of the old order. For many of the laws and administrative methods which were suppressed in 1789 reappeared a few years later, much as some rivers after going underground re-emerge at another point, in new surroundings.
Topic:
Democratization, Economics, and Emerging Markets
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, Asia, and France

23. The Duma Election

Author:
Leon Aron
Publication Date:
01-2004
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research
Abstract:
The December 7, 2003, election to the Russian parliament, the State Duma, has been portrayed in the U.S. media as mostly a product of the Kremlin's machinations. Its "administrative resources"--most importantly, its control of national television channels--are said to be almost entirely responsible for the winning performance of the "party of power," United Russia, which garnered 37 percent of the party-list vote among twenty-three parties and blocs on the ballot.
Topic:
Democratization, Economics, and Emerging Markets
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, and Asia

24. The YUKOS Affair

Author:
Leon Aron
Publication Date:
09-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research
Abstract:
In the early morning of October 25, 2003, masked agents of the Russian security agency, the FSB, stormed the plane of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, CEO and principal owner of Russia's largest private oil company, YUKOS; arrested him; and conveyed him to a Moscow prison. He was charged with tax evasion, fraud, forgery, and embezzlement.
Topic:
Democratization, Economics, and Emerging Markets
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, and Asia

25. Strengthening Financial Sector Governance in Emerging Markets

Author:
Robert Litan, Michael Pomerleano, and V. Sundararajan
Publication Date:
07-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Brookings Institution
Abstract:
Policymakers and analysts are still sifting through the wreckage of the Asian financial crisis of 1997 and the subsequent crises in Russia, Turkey, and Argentina to discern key lessons so that similar crises will not recur. Some lessons are by now well understood. Pegged exchange rates can encourage excessive borrowing and expose countries to financial collapse when foreign exchange reserves run dry. Inadequate disclosures by both private companies and public bodies can lead to similar dangers. Although many factors undoubtedly contributed to these crises, it is now widely recognized that each suffered from a failure in “governance,” and in particular a failure in governance in their financial sectors. Accordingly, the World Bank Group, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the Brookings Institution devoted their fourth annual Financial Markets and Development Conference, held in New York from April 17-19, 2002, to the subject of financial sector governance in emerging markets. This conference report summarizes some of the highlights of the conference, whose full proceedings will be published as a Brookings book in the fall of 2002.
Topic:
Economics, Emerging Markets, Government, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
Russia, New York, Turkey, Asia, and Argentina

26. A Private Hero for a Privatized Country

Author:
Leon Aron
Publication Date:
06-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research
Abstract:
The most interesting phenomenon on Russia's literary scene today is the popularity of the Erast Fandorin mysteries by Grigoriy Shalvovich Chkhartishvili, who writes as Boris Akunin.
Topic:
Democratization, Economics, and Emerging Markets
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, and Asia

27. An Anchor in the Mud

Author:
Leon Aron
Publication Date:
09-2001
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research
Abstract:
For almost two centuries—since Alexander Pushkin's masterpieces laid the foundation—Russian literature has persisted in addressing the core issues and dilemmas of human existence, taking humanity's measure, and explaining Russia and Russians to themselves and the world. Even during the Soviet era, when virtually all of Russia's finest writers and poets were exiled, killed, imprisoned, savagely censored, or forbidden to publish, the tradition lived in underground samizdat, manuscripts smuggled abroad, and in the state-run literary magazines of the “liberal” persuasion, especially during political thaws.
Topic:
Democratization, Economics, and Emerging Markets
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, Asia, and Soviet Union

28. Structure and Context in the Study of Post-Soviet Russia

Author:
Leon Aron
Publication Date:
01-2001
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research
Abstract:
The Berlin Wall fell eleven years ago, and nine years have passed since Boris Yeltsin launched the Russian economic revolution by abolishing state control over prices. Although minuscule in historic terms, the time elapsed still furnishes a wealth of data for a provisional analysis of the key factors that shaped the political, economic, and social character of post-Communist nations. The same structural variables may help gauge the future—at least in the short to medium term.
Topic:
Democratization, Economics, and Emerging Markets
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, Asia, and Berlin

29. U.S. Assistance for Market Reforms: Foreign Aid Failures in Russia and the Former Soviet Bloc

Author:
Janine R. Wedel
Publication Date:
03-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
Since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the subsequent breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, the governments of the United States and other Western countries have provided massive aid to promote a transition to the free market in Central and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. But aid for market reforms in the region has been largely ineffective. Whether provided in the form of technical assistance, grants to political groups or nongovernmental organizations, loans and guarantees to the private sector, or direct financial aid to post-communist governments, that aid has been plagued by a number of problems. The failed $22.6 billion bailout of Russia by the International Monetary Fund in July 1998 only confirmed the flawed nature of the aid-for-reform approach.
Topic:
Economics and Emerging Markets
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, Europe, Eastern Europe, Asia, and Soviet Union