Global Financial Stability Report
The Global Financial Stability Report provides an assessment of the global financial system and markets, and addresses emerging market financing in a global context. It focuses on current market conditions, highlighting systemic issues that could pose a risk to financial stability and sustained market access by emerging market borrowers. The Report draws out the financial ramifications of economic imbalances highlighted by the IMF's World Economic Outlook. It contains, as special features, analytical chapters or essays on structural or systemic issues relevant to international financial stability.
2015
IMF Global Financial Stability Report: Navigating Monetary Policy Challenges and Managing Risks
April 8, 2015
Description: The April 2015 Global Financial Stability Report (GFSR) finds the Global financial stability risks have risen since October. Chapter 1 finds that these risks have also been pivoting away from banks to shadow banks, from solvency to market liquidity risks, and from advanced economies to emerging markets. Chapters 2 and 3 examine developments in international banking and the potential risks stemming from the financial management industry.
2014
IMF Global Financial Stability Report: Risk Taking, Liquidity, and Shadow Banking: Curbing Excess While Promoting Growth
October 1, 2014
Description: The October 2014 Global Financial Stability Report (GFSR) finds that six years after the start of the crisis, the global economic recovery continues to rely heavily on accommodative monetary policies in advanced economies. Monetary accommodation remains critical in supporting the economy by encouraging economic risk taking in the form of increased real spending by households and greater willingness to invest and hire by businesses. However, prolonged monetary ease may also encourage excessive financial risk taking. Chapter 1 concludes that although economic benefits of monetary ease are becoming more evident in some economies, market and liquidity risks have increased to levels that could compromise financial stability if left unaddressed. The best way to safeguard financial stability and improve the balance between economic and financial risk taking is to put in place policies that enhance the transmission of monetary policy to the real economy—thus promoting economic risk taking—and address financial excesses through well-designed macroprudential measures. Chapter 2 examines the growth of shadow banking around the globe, assessing risks and discussing regulatory responses. Although shadow banking takes vastly different forms within and across countries, some of its key drivers tend to be common to all: search for yield, regulatory circumvention, and demand by institutional investors. The contribution of shadow banks to systemic risks in the financial system is much larger in the United States than in Europe. The chapter calls for a more encompassing (macroprudential) approach to regulation and for enhanced data provision. Chapter 3 discusses how conflicts of interest between bank managers, shareholders, and debt holders can lead to excessive bank risk taking from society’s point of view. It finds that banks with boards of directors independent from management take less risk. There is no clear relation between bank risk and the level of executive compensation, but a better alignment of bankers’ pay with long-term outcomes is associated with less risk.
IMF Global Financial Stability Report (GFSR) -- April 2014 -- Table of Contents
April 15, 2014
Description: The April 2014 Global Financial Stability Report (GFSR) assesses the challenging transitions that the global financial system is currently undergoing on the path to greater stability. Chapter 1 finds that these transitions are far from complete, and stability conditions are far from normal. For advanced and emerging market economies alike, a successful shift from liquidity-driven to growth-driven markets requires a number of elements. The report discusses these elements, including: a normalization of U.S. monetary policy that avoids financial stability risks; financial rebalancing in emerging market economies amid tighter external financial conditions and higher corporate debt levels; further progress in the euro area’s transition from fragmentation to robust integration; and the successful implementation of Abenomics in Japan to deliver sustained growth and stable inflation. Chapter 2 examines the role of the composition of the investor base and local financial systems for the stability of emerging market portfolio flows and asset prices. Chapter 3 looks at the issue of too-important-to-fail and provides new estimates of the implicit funding subsidy received by systemically important banks.
2013
IMF Global Financial Stability Report (GFSR) -- October 2013 -- Table of Contents
October 9, 2013
Description: The October 2013 Global Financial Stability (GFSR) Report examines current risks facing the global financial system as it undergoes a series of transitions along the path toward greater financial stability. The United States may soon move to less accommodative monetary policies and higher long-term interest rates as its recovery gains ground. Emerging markets face a transition to more volatile external conditions and higher risk premiums. Japan is moving toward the new “Abenomics” policy regime, and the euro area is moving toward a more robust and safer financial sector. Finally, the global banking system is phasing in stronger regulatory standards. Chapter 1 examines the challenges and risks of each of these transitions. Chapter 2 looks at efforts by policymakers to revive weak credit growth, which has been seen by many as a primary reason behind the slow economic recovery. The chapter argues that policies are most effective if they target the constraints that underlie the weakness in credit. But it cautions policymakers to be aware of the fiscal costs and implications for financial stability of credit-supporting policies. Chapter 3 examines how banking funding structures matter for financial stability and the potential impact of various regulatory reforms. It concludes that careful implementation of reform efforts are important to ensure that financial stability benefits are realized.
IMF Global Financial Stability Report (GFSR) -- April 2013 -- Table of Contents
April 17, 2013
Description: The April 2013 Global Financial Stability Report (GFSR) examines current risks facing the global financial system and policy actions that may mitigate these. The April 2013 report analyzes the key challenges facing financial and nonfinancial firms as they continue to repair their balance sheets and unwind public and private debt overhangs. Chapter 1 also examines short- and medium-term stability risks in the euro area and the vulnerability of emerging market economies to persistent capital inflows. Chapter 2 takes a closer look at whether sovereign credit default swaps markets are good indicators of sovereign credit risk. Chapter 3 reports on unconventional monetary policy in some depth, including the policies pursued by the Federal Reserve, the Bank of England, the Bank of Japan, the European Central Bank, and the U.S. Federal Reserve.
2012
Restoring Confidence and Progressing on Reforms -- IMF Global Financial Stability Report (GFSR) -- October 2012 -- Table of Contents
October 10, 2012
Description: The October 2012 Global Financial Stability Report (GFSR) finds increased risks to the global financial system, with the euro area crisis the principal source of concern. The report urges policymakers to act now to restore confidence, reverse capital flight, and reintegrate the euro zone. In both Japan and the United States, steps are needed toward medium-term fiscal adjustment. Emerging market economies have successfully navigated global shocks thus far, but need to guard against future shocks while managing a slowdown in growth. This GFSR also examines whether regulatory reforms are moving the financial system in the right direction, and finds that progress has been limited, partly because many reforms are in the early stages of implementation and partly because crisis intervention methods are still in use in a number of economies, delaying the movement of the financial system onto a safer path. The final chapter assesses whether certain aspects of financial structure enhance economic outcomes. Indeed, some structural features are associated with better outcomes. In particular, financial buffers made up of high-quality capital and truly liquid assets tend to be associated with better economic performance.
The Quest for Lasting Stability -- IMF Global Financial Stability Report (GFSR) -- April 2012
April 11, 2012
Description: The April 2012 Global Financial Stability Report assesses changes in risks to financial stability over the past six months, focusing on sovereign vulnerabilities, risks stemming from private sector deleveraging, and assessing the continued resilience of emerging markets. The report probes the implications of recent reforms in the financial system for market perception of safe assets, and investigates the growing public and private costs of increased longevity risk from aging populations -- April 2012.
2011
Grappling with Crisis Legacies: IMF Global Financial Stability Report (GFSR)
September 13, 2011
Description: The September 2011 issue of the Global Financial Stability Report cautions that the risks to global financial stability have increased substantially in recent months, during which heavy public debt burdens and weak growth prospects in many advanced economies combined with a series of shocks to the global financial system. Emerging markets, despite brighter growth prospects, face the risk of sharp reversals and so must guard against the buildup of financial vulnerabilities. Moreover, says the Report, as the crisis has moved into its fifth year, it has entered a new phase in which political differences within and across economies are impeding progress to address the legacies of the crisis. The Report examines how the ongoing low interest rate environment and high uncertainty are driving the asset allocations of long-term, real-money institutional investors, and finds that such investors have moved toward safety and liquidity. As part of its continuing role to find ways of avoiding future crisis, the Report looks at variables that can act as advance indicators of financial crisis and examines how the use of countercyclical capital buffers can help to dampen destabilizing cycles.
IMF Global Financial Stability Report (GFSR) -- Durable Financial Stability: Getting There from Here; April 2011 -- Contents
April 13, 2011
Description: GFSR April 2011: Despite ongoing economic recovery and improvements in global financial stability, structural weaknesses and vulnerabilities remain in some important financial systems. The April 2011 Global Financial Stability Report highlights how risks have changed over the past six months, traces the sources and channels of financial distress with an emphasis on sovereign risk, notes the pressures arising from capital inflows in emerging economies, and discusses policy proposals under consideration to mend the global financial system.
2010
IMF Global Financial Stability Report (GFSR) -- Sovereigns, Funding, and Systemic Liquidity; October 2010 -- Contents
October 29, 2010
Description: October 2010: The global financial system is still in a period of significant uncertainty and remains the Achilles’ heel of the economic recovery. Although the ongoing recovery is expected to result in a gradual strengthening of balance sheets, progress toward financial stability has experienced a setback since the April 2010 GFSR. The current report highlights how risks have changed over the last six months, traces the sources and channels of financial distress with an emphasis on sovereign risk, and provides a discussion of policy proposals under consideration to mend the global financial system.