## Instruments of Debtstruction: A New Database of Interwar Debt

_IMF Working Papers, October 25, 2019_

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## Bibliographic details
- Authors: Nicolas End, Marina Marinkov, Fedor Miryugin
- Published: October 25, 2019
- Series: IMF Working Papers
- DOI: https://doi.org/10.5089/9781513514550.001

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### Overview
- Authors: Nicolas End, Marina Marinkov, Fedor Miryugin
- Publication date: October 25, 2019
- Type: IMF Working Papers, Working Paper No. 2019/226, Issue 226, Volume 2019
- Pages: 47

### Database construction and scope
- Coverage: 18 advanced and emerging countries
- Time period: 1913–46
- Instruments: some 3,800 individual debt instruments
- Instrument-level data fields included:
  - amounts outstanding
  - instrument type
  - coupon rate
  - maturity
  - currency of issue

### Key substantive findings
- The interwar period was characterized by notoriously high debt levels.
- Governments engaged in rollover practices that sustained debts that were largely unsustainable.
- The external public debt network played a role in the collapse of the international financial system in the early 1930s.

### Research uses and insights
- Instrument-level amounts and qualitative features provide unique insights into policies implemented in the interwar period.
- Data facilitate analysis of:
  - debt maturity structure
  - coupon rate and rate of return issues
  - central bank exposure and interactions with government debt
  - how debt management practices influenced macroeconomic and financial stability during the interwar era

### Subjects and keywords
- Subjects: Bonds, External debt, Financial institutions, Government debt management, Public debt, Public financial management (PFM), Securities
- Keywords: Bonds, central bank, central bank exposure, coupon rate, debt contract, debt management matter, debt management practice, debt maturity structure, Debt Policy, Economic History, Global, gold standard, Government debt management, longer-term maturity debt, Macroeconomics, maturity, Public Finance, rate of return, Securities, short-term debt, structure of debt, WP

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_Source: https://www.imf.org/en/publications/wp/issues/2019/10/25/instruments-of-debtstruction-a-new-database-of-interwar-debt-48689_