IMF begins to publish quarterly reports on emerging market financing

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On August 9, the IMF began the regular publication on its website of Emerging Market Financing: Quarterly Report on Developments and Prospects.

The report is an element of the IMF’s surveillance of developments in international capital markets. It draws, in part, on regular informal discussions with a broad set of private financial market participants. A staff team in the IMF Research Department, headed by Bankim Chadha, prepared the report, with comments and suggestions from other IMF departments and from Executive Directors.

The report indicates that emerging bond and equity markets during the second quarter of 2000 were hostage to volatile conditions in international capital markets. An adverse external environment dominated positive domestic fundamentals. In particular:

• In April and May 2000, as the mature equity markets declined, expectations of U.S. interest rates were revised up, competing credit markets deteriorated, and the euro fell to a low point. Consequently, emerging market assets registered substantial losses, while bond and equity issues slowed to a trickle.

• In June, as U.S. interest rate concerns eased, emerging market assets and fund-raising on bond and equity markets rebounded along with global markets.

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