A Few White Papers
you are currently viewing::Pension Reform and Stock Market DevelopmentFebruary 28, 2025-Summary We also highlight the challenges of individual impatience, network externalities, and coordination failure in long-term equity investments, which are crucial for stock market development and technological innovation. We find that FICMI pension schemes-when sufficiently wide in coverage and large in size-can serve as coordination devices to support long-term equity investments. Such investments will not only promote domestic stock market development and make it easier for firms to raise long-term equity capital, therefore supporting long-term economic growth, but also enhance financial inclusion and enable more households to benefit from the overall economic development, therefore contributing to inclusive growth. Moreover, we find that the introduction of FICMI pension schemes can impact household savings in two ways: first, FICMI pension can increase household savings through "forced/incentivized" savings channel, where households save too little without FICMI pension (such as in many EMDEs); and second, FICMI pension can decrease household savings and increase household consumption by reducing non-pension savings and decreasing precautionary savings, where households save too much without FICMI pension (such as in China). In both cases, FICMI pension schemes can help move the economy closer to the optimal level of household savings, and may also help improve the structure of such savings. Finally, we discuss the enabling conditions (such as a strong political commitment to the reform and a well-designed fiscal strategy for financing the transition) and policy design for FICMI pension schemes. Source: imf.org |
IMF Working Paper: Understanding China's 2024-25 Frontloading from the Lens of Product-Level Export Baskets
January 23, 2026-Summary
A striking feature of US-China trade tensions in mid-2025 is China's acceleration of exports to the US ahead of new tariff increases, a phenomenon we term export frontloading. To understand how this was achieved, we develop a factor model analytical framework to characterize China's product-level exports, across time and destinations, according to a set of latent export baskets.
IMF Working Paper: Structural Reforms in Saudi Arabia Since 2016
January 23, 2026-Summary
Since 2016, Saudi Arabia's Vision 2030 reforms have improved governance, business regulations, capital markets, the labor market, and the external sector, narrowing structural gaps with frontier economies and improving economic performance.
IMF Working Paper: Structural Reforms in Saudi Arabia Since 2016
January 23, 2026-Summary
Canada is adjusting to the largest shift in North American trade policy since
NAFTA. The economy has been more resilient than initially feared, supported by
USMCA exemptions, resilient consumption, and policy cushioning.
IMF Working Paper: From Par to Pressure: Liquidity, Redemptions, and Fire Sales with a Systemic Stablecoin
January 16, 2026-Summary
Fiat-backed stablecoins are expanding, and their issuers may attain systemic relevance as reserve portfolios grow and as they become increasingly intertwined with financial markets. This paper analyzes the resulting risks and the design choices that can mitigate them. A detailed financial-economics discussion forms the core of the paper.
IMF Working Paper: Market Access and High Spread Issuances
January 16, 2026-Summary
We investigate the factors determining emerging markets' likelihood to access international capital markets. First, we develop a simple model to outline the theoretical foundations of market access, highlighting the role of risk, spreads, net worth, and the cost of repaying debt. The model also shows a trade-off between risk insurance and moral hazard and underscores the relevance of unconventional instruments such as guarantees and macro-contingent debt.
IMF Working Paper The Economic Implications of the Energy Transition in Asia-Pacific
January 9, 2026--Summary
This paper examines the economic effects of the global energy transition and the large uncertainty surrounding future fossil fuel demand on countries in the Asia-Pacific region. Under the paper's baseline, coal demand is expected to shrink by 15 percent by 2035, although depending on global policy ambition and technological uptake, the decline could be as large as 45 percent.
Four Futures for the New Economy: Geoeconomics and Technology in 2030
January 12, 2025-Four Futures for the New Economy: Geoeconomics and Technology in 2030 explores how the powerful interplay between geopolitical shifts and rapid technological change is reshaping the global economic landscape.
IMF Working Paper Demographics and Consumption in Asia Toward 2050
November 21, 2025-Summary
What are the implications of demographics on total consumption and its sectoral composition in Asia toward 2050? Although the literature has studied total consumption and individual consumption categories separately, the research that studies both is scarce.
IMF Working Paper Elections Matter: Capital Flows and Political Cycles
November 19, 2025-Summary
How should central banks explore tokenized reserves? Central banks are increasingly exploring how to make their reserves available to selected banks using distributed ledger technology, referred to as tokenized reserves.
IMF Working Paper Elections Matter: Capital Flows and Political Cycles
November 14, 2025-Summary
This paper contributes to the relatively limited literature on the impact of political uncertainty on international capital flows to emerging market economies. We incorporate elections as a proxy for political uncertainty into a standard push-pull framework for analyzing capital flows.
