This paper attempts to identify the fundamental variables that drive the credit default swaps during the initial phase of distress in selected European Large Complex Financial Institutions (LCFIs). It uses yearly data over 2004 - 08 for 29 European LCFIs. The results from a dynamic panel data estimator show that LCFIs’ business models, earnings potential, and economic uncertainty (represented by market expectations about the future risks of a particular LCFI and market views on prospects for economic growth) are among the most significant determinants of credit risk. The findings of the paper are broadly consistent with those of the literature on bank failure, where the determinants of the latter include the entire CAMELS structure - that is, Capital Adequacy, Asset Quality, Management Quality, Earnings Potential, Liquidity, and Sensitivity to Market Risk. By establishing a link between the financial and market fundamentals of LCFIs and their CDS spreads, the paper offers a potential tool for fundamentals-based vulnerability and early warning system for LCFIs.

In the United States, some populations suffer from far greater disparities in health than others. Those disparities are caused not only by fundamental differences in health status across segments of the population, but also because of inequities in factors that impact health status, so-called determinants of health. Only part of an individual's health status depends on his or her behavior and choice; community-wide problems like poverty, unemployment, poor education, inadequate housing, poor public transportation, interpersonal violence, and decaying neighborhoods also contribute to health inequities, as well as the historic and ongoing interplay of structures, policies, and norms that shape lives. When these factors are not optimal in a community, it does not mean they are intractable: such inequities can be mitigated by social policies that can shape health in powerful ways. Communities in Action: Pathways to Health Equity seeks to delineate the causes of and the solutions to health inequities in the United States. This report focuses on what communities can do to promote health equity, what actions are needed by the many and varied stakeholders that are part of communities or support them, as well as the root causes and structural barriers that need to be overcome.

Existing models fail to explain the large fluctuations in the real exchange rates of most currencies over the past twenty years. The Natural Real Exchange Rate approach (NATREX) taken here offers an alternative paradigm to those which focus on short-run movements of nominal eschange rates, purchasing power parity of the representative agent intertemporal optimization models. Yet it is also neo-classical in its stress upon the accepted fundamentals driving a real economy. It concentrates on the real exchange rate, and explains medium- tolong-run movements in equilibrium real exchange rates in terms of fundamental variables: the productivity of capital and social (public plus private) thrift at home and abroad. The NATREX approach is a family of growth models, each tailored to the characteristics of the countries considered. The authors explain the real international value of the US dollar relativ to the G10 countries, and the US current account. These are two large economies. The model is also applied to small economies, where it explains the real value of the Australian dollar and the Latin American currencies relative to the US dollar. The model is relevant for developing countries where the foreign debt is a concern. Finally, it is applied to two medium-sized economies to explain the bilateral exchange rate between the French franc and the Deutsche Mark. The authors demonstrate both the promise of the NATREX model and its applicability to economies large and small. Alongside the analysis, econometrics, and technical details of these case studies, the introductory chapter explains in accessible terms the rationale behind the approach. The mix of theory and empirical evidence makes this book relevant to academics and advanced graduate students, and to central banks, ministries of finance, and those concerned with the foreign debt of developing countries.

Based on detailed research and consultation with experts, including the Bank of England, this book reviews theoretical and historical debates on the nature of money and banking and explains the role of the central bank, the Government and the European Union. Following a sell out first edition and reprint, this second edition includes new sections on Libor and quantitative easing in the UK and the sovereign debt crisis in Europe.

March 1998 Differences in interest margins reflect differences in bank characteristics, macroeconomic conditions, existing financial structure and taxation, regulation, and other institutional factors. Using bank data for 80 countries for 1988-95, Demirgüç-Kunt and Huizinga show that differences in interest margins and bank profitability reflect various determinants: * Bank characteristics. * Macroeconomic conditions. * Explicit and implicit bank taxes. * Regulation of deposit insurance. * General financial structure. * Several underlying legal and institutional indicators. Controlling for differences in bank activity, leverage, and the macroeconomic environment, they find (among other things) that: * Banks in countries with a more competitive banking sector-where banking assets constitute a larger share of GDP-have smaller margins and are less profitable. The bank concentration ratio also affects bank profitability; larger banks tend to have higher margins. * Well-capitalized banks have higher net interest margins and are more profitable. This is consistent with the fact that banks with higher capital ratios have a lower cost of funding because of lower prospective bankruptcy costs. * Differences in a bank's activity mix affect spread and profitability. Banks with relatively high noninterest-earning assets are less profitable. Also, banks that rely largely on deposits for their funding are less profitable, as deposits require more branching and other expenses. Similarly, variations in overhead and other operating costs are reflected in variations in bank interest margins, as banks pass their operating costs (including the corporate tax burden) on to their depositors and lenders. * In developing countries foreign banks have greater margins and profits than domestic banks. In industrial countries, the opposite is true. * Macroeconomic factors also explain variation in interest margins. Inflation is associated with higher realized interest margins and greater profitability. Inflation brings higher costs-more transactions and generally more extensive branch networks-and also more income from bank float. Bank income increases more with inflation than bank costs do. * There is evidence that the corporate tax burden is fully passed on to bank customers in poor and rich countries alike. * Legal and institutional differences matter. Indicators of better contract enforcement, efficiency in the legal system, and lack of corruption are associated with lower realized interest margins and lower profitability. This paper-a product of the Development Research Group-is part of a larger effort in the group to study bank efficiency.