This book provides a comprehensive investigation of the messy and crisis-ridden relationship between the operations of capitalist finance, global capital flows, and state power in emerging markets. The politics, drivers of emergence, and diversity of these myriad forms of state power are explored in light of the positionality of emerging markets within the network of space and power relations that characterises contemporary global finance. The book develops a multi-disciplinary perspective and combines insights from Marxist political economy, post-Keynesian economics, economic geography, and postcolonial and feminist International Political Economy. Alami comprehensively reviews the theories, histories, and geographies of cross-border finance management, and develops a conceptual framework which allows unpacking the complex entanglement of constraint and opportunities, of growing integration and tight discipline, that cross-border finance represents for emerging markets. Extensive fieldwork research provides an in-depth comparative critical interrogation of the policies and regulations deployed in Brazil and South Africa. This volume will be especially useful to those researching and working in the areas of international political economy, contemporary geographies of money and finance, and critical development studies. It should also prove of interest to policy makers, practitioners, and activists concerned with the relation between finance and development in emerging markets and beyond.

In Ruling Capital, Kevin P. Gallagher demonstrates how several emerging market and developing countries (EMDs) managed to reregulate cross-border financial flows in the wake of the global financial crisis, despite the political and economic difficulty of doing so at the national level. Gallagher also shows that some EMDs, particularly the BRICS coalition, were able to maintain or expand their sovereignty to regulate cross-border finance under global economic governance institutions. Gallagher combines econometric analysis with in-depth interviews with officials and interest groups in select emerging markets and policymakers at the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organization, and the G-20 to explain key characteristics of the global economy. Gallagher develops a theory of countervailing monetary power that shows how emerging markets can counter domestic and international opposition to the regulation of cross-border finance. Although many countries were able to exert countervailing monetary power in the wake of the crisis, such power was not sufficient to stem the magnitude of unstable financial flows that continue to plague the world economy. Drawing on this theory, Gallagher outlines the significant opportunities and obstacles to regulating cross-border finance in the twenty-first century.

The world is upside down. The emerging market countries are more important than many investors realise. They have been catching up with the West over the past few decades. Greater market freedom has spread since the end of the Cold War, and with it institutional changes which have further assisted emerging economies in becoming more productive, flexible, and resilient. The Western financial crisis from 2008 has quickened the pace of the relative rise of emerging markets - their relative economic power, and with it political power, but also their financial power as savers, investors and creditors. Emerging Markets in an Upside Down World - Challenging Perceptions in Asset Allocation and Investment argues that finance theory has misunderstood risk and that this has led to poor investment decisions; and that emerging markets constitute a good example of why traditional finance theory is faulty. The book accurately describes the complex and changing global environment currently facing the investor and asset allocator. It raises many questions often bypassed because of the use of simplifying assumptions and models. The narrative builds towards a checklist of issues and questions for the asset allocator and investor and then to a discussion of a variety of regulatory and policy issues. Aimed at institutional and retail investors as well as economics, finance, business and international relations students, Emerging Markets in an Upside Down World covers many complex ideas, but is written to be accessible to the non-expert.

Using a sample of 34 emerging markets and developing economies over the period 2009Q3-2015Q4, the paper employs a panel framework to study the determinants of capital flows, both net and gross, across a wide range of instruments. The baseline regressions are then extended to focus on high and low episodes – quarters with flows one standard deviation above/below mean. Overall, the results suggest that the capital flow slowdown witnessed in recent years is due to a combination of lower growth prospects of recipient countries and worse global risk sentiment. However, the determinants of flows can be considerably different across instruments and across the type of flows considered, net or gross. The sensitivity of certain types of flows, towards push and pull factors, increases during periods of high and low capital flows. Moreover, some variables may not necessarily be significant during normal times, but can be important drivers during such episodes, and vice versa. Indicators like the gap between the U.S. long- and short-term maturity bond yields – not significant during normal times – can be an important driver during high episodes.

International investors poured vast sums of money into East Asian and Latin American countries during the mid-1990s, when the emerging market boom was at its peak. Then Thailand stumbled and panic seized the markets, and boom gave way to bust. Investors suffered large financial losses, while Asian countries suddenly experienced large capital outflows and the macroeconomic pressures these wrought plunged countries that had been growing rapidly ("miraculously") into crisis. Much the same had happened in Latin America when the debt crisis broke in 1982. This book investigates what can be done to make the international capital market a constructive force in promoting development in emerging markets. John Williamson concludes that the problem of cyclicality that has undermined the value of international borrowing cannot be tackled just, or even mainly, from the supply side, but will require actions on the part of both creditors and debtors.

In a little over one decade, the spread of market-oriented policies has turned the once so-called lesser developed countries into emerging markets. Many forces have been responsible for the tremendous growth in emerging markets. Trends toward market-oriented policies that permit private ownership of economic activities, such as public utilities and telecommunications, are part of the explanation. Corporate restructuring, following the debt crisis of the early 1980's has permitted many emerging market companies to gain international competitiveness. And an essential condition, a basic sea-change in economic policy, has opened up many emerging markets to international investors. This growth in emerging markets has been accompanied by volatility in individual markets, and a sector-wide shock after the meltdown in the Mexican Bolsa and Mexican peso, resulting in heated debate over the nature of these markets. Emerging market capital flows continue to be the subject of intense discussion around the world among investors, academics, and policymakers. Emerging Market Capital Flows examines the issues of emerging market capital flows from several distinct perspectives, addressing a number of related questions about emerging markets.

Capital flow volatility is a concern for macroeconomic and financial stability. Nonetheless, literature is scarce in this topic. Our paper sheds light on this issue in two dimensions. First, using quarterly data for 65 countries over the period 1970Q1-2016Q1, we construct three measures of volatility, for total capital flows and key instruments. Second, we perform panel regressions to understand the determinants of volatility. The measures show that the volatility of all instruments is prone to bouts, rising sharply during global shocks like the taper tantrum episode. Capital flow volatility thus remains a challenge for policy makers. The regression results suggest that push factors can be more important than pull factors in explaining volatility, illustrating that the characteristics of volatility can be different from those of the flows levels.