Contagion in the stock markets: The Asian financial crisis revisited

This paper presents empirical evidence of herding contagion in the stock markets during the 1997 Asian financial crisis, above and beyond macroeconomic fundamental driven co-movements. We analyze the cross-country time-varying correlation coefficients among the stock prices for the countries of Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Korea, and the Philippines, between crisis and tranquil periods. Macromodels are constructed and implemented to capture the pure contagion effects on the markets. After controlling for the economic fundamentals for the five countries, the paper finds strong evidence of herding contagion.     

Time-varying beta and the Asian financial crisis: Evidence from the Asian industrial sectors

This paper empirically investigates the effects of the Asian financial crisis of 1997–98, and the period immediately afterwards, on the time-varying beta of four industrial sectors (chemical, finance, retail and industry) of Indonesia, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan. We apply daily data from 1992 to 2002 and the bivariate MA-GARCH model (BEKK) to create the time-varying industrial betas. Results provide evidence of the influence of the Asian financial crisis, and the period after, on the time-varying industrial betas of these countries. These results may have implications for investors who are interested in portfolio risk management.     

Fiscal lessons from the East Asian financial crisis

This paper examines the financial crises experienced in East Asian countries beginning in 1997. A common thread of these occurrences is the failure to address the risks of positions and policies by either the public or private sector, suggesting that there is a need to improve fiscal flexibility, to better understand public sector assets and liabilities, and for a more flexible public cash management or control system. The international community may need to establish fast-disbursing assistance systems to support this increased flexibility.     

Asian financial crisis and East Asian economic cooperation: A Chinese view∗

The Asian financial crisis has devastated East Asia in many aspects. While social unrest was witnessed in some states, social problems have arisen in others because of the reforms undertaken. States undergoing reforms are learning their lessons at a very expensive price. These are lessons essential and vital to the cause of regional cooperation. From a theoretical perspective, without these lessons, the debates on the need and importance of regional cooperation would have gone on incessantly without any real progress. Although expensive, once the crisis‐hit states succeeds in instituting the reforms attached to the financial package from international financial institution, the future prospects for regional economic cooperation are not too unfavorable. While China can afford to maintain its current position on the crisis, the rest has an obligation to fulfill its responsibility so as to lay a solid foundation for regional cooperation to ripen.     

亚洲金融危机应对措施回顾与借鉴

本文简要回顾了1998年亚洲金融危机时我国采取的应对措施及其效果,并分析了当前我国经济中存在的突出问题和当前经济形势与亚洲金融危机时的不同,在此基础上提出了应对危机的对策建议。     

The co-movement of stock markets in East Asia: Did the 1997–1998 Asian financial crisis really strengthen stock market integration?

This paper examines the integration and causality of interdependencies among seven major East Asian stock exchanges before, during, and after the 1997–1998 Asian financial crisis. For this purpose, we use daily stock market data from July 1, 1992 to June 30, 2003 in local currency as well as US dollar terms. The data reveal that the relationships among East Asian stock markets are time varying. While stock market interactions are limited before the Asian financial crisis, we find that Hong Kong and Singapore respond significantly to shocks in most other East Asian markets, including Shanghai and Shenzhen, during this crisis. After the crisis, shocks in Hong Kong and Singapore largely affect other East Asian stock markets, except for those in Mainland China. Finally, considering the role of the USA shows that it strongly influences stock returns in East Asia – except for Mainland China – in all periods, while the reverse does not hold true.     

Convergence or divergence?*: The South Korean state after the Asian financial crisis

This study suggests that the government's attempt to replace the developmental state by introducing neo‐liberal axioms is slim. The state that is to emerge in consequence of the economic and financial reforms carried out by the Kim government is distinct from the neo‐liberal regulatory state at the ideological level; moreover, the embedded characteristics of the developmental state hinder changes in the nature of the state. It is the paper's argument that the economic reform that has been implemented by the Kim Dae‐Jung government since its establishment (in 1998) is merely a form of “self‐help” to correct those mistakes committed by the developmental state. Despite the neo‐liberal reform attempted by the Kim government, the social, political and historical conditions in which a liberal regulatory state may be born are pre‐mature, and the embedded legacies of the developmental state are far from becoming a thing of the past.     

From the Asian crisis to the global credit crisis: reforming the international financial architecture redux

2008 was marked by the tenth anniversary of the Asian crisis and the debate over how to reform the international financial architecture but also by the outbreak of the most serious global credit crisis in generations. This paper reviews the debate over how to strengthen the international monetary and financial system in this light. An earlier version of this paper was presented to a meeting of the Tokyo Club, Tokyo, Japan, 11–12 November 2008. Comments of the participants there and of the editors of this journal are acknowledged with thanks. I am grateful as well to the Tokyo Club for permission to publish this revised version. Financial support from the Coleman Fund Risk Management Research Center at the University of California, Berkeley is acknowledged with thanks.

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Foreign direct investment in crisis and recovery: lessons from the 1997–1998 Asian crisis

Is foreign direct investment more resilient at the onset of an economic crisis and the subsequent economic collapse in a host country compared to other forms of foreign capital inflows? Are affiliates of multinational enterprises in a crisis‐hit country better equipped to withstand a crisis and aid the recovery process by readjusting their investment, production and sales strategies compared to local firms? This article examines these issues in the context of the 1997–1998 economic crisis in Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Korea and the Philippines. The findings suggest that foreign direct investment was a relatively stable source of foreign capital in the crisis context and that the affiliates of multinational enterprises were instrumental in ameliorating the severity of economic collapse and facilitating the recovery process.     

金融危机下我国旅游消费需求的口红效应研究

本文采用了实证研究和定性分析相结合的方法,从入境旅游、国内旅游、出境旅游三个方面分析了全球金融危机对我国旅游需求的影响。经过分析发现了金融危机下我国旅游消费需求的"口红效应"现象。同时,本文通过理论论证揭示了旅游业将逐渐从"口红效应"的被边缘化的角色转变为受益者,希望为我国旅游业在今后应对类似危机的经营管理中提供有益的借鉴。     

Implications of financial crisis for east Asian trend growth

The article sets the Asian financial crisis in the context ofthe developmental state model of Asian development and seesit as, in part, the downside risk of a financial liberalizationthat was badly handled but nevertheless appropriate as a stimulusto better productivity performance. The East Asian economiesare shown still to have a large labour productivity gap withthe leading OECD countries and substantial scope for furtherrapid catch-up growth. Historical experience suggests that thepolicy response to the crisis is fundamental not only to immediaterecovery prospects but also to realizing this remaining fastgrowth potential.     

Working capital management during the global financial crisis: Evidence from Japan

This paper demonstrates the adjustment speed of firm working capital and the relationships between working capital and firm performance in Japan during the global financial crisis. Using quarterly firm-level data, we find that the adjustment of working capital was weaker during the crisis. Moreover, the negative relationship between excess working capital and firm performance became more significant during the crisis, especially for larger firms. However, this crisis-related working capital–firm performance effect does not appear to persist for very long, because to finance any excess working capital, firms borrow from banks and reduce their internal cash both during and outside periods of crisis.     

The index of agency cost and the financial accelerator: the case of Japan

An index of the agency costs is constructed using the Kalman Filter, and an example of this index, pertaining to small Japanese manufacturing firms is estimated for the period 1976–1998. The results indicate the index reflects macroeconomic fluctuations and it is appropriate for use as a proxy for agency costs instead of the cash flow proxy that most empirical studies have adopted to date. Employing this index, the author demonstrates via a Markov-switching model that a steep rise in agency costs occurred immediately before the depression of the 1990s. These results provide support for the financial accelerator theory.     

Capital gains tax and individual trading: The case of Japan

Japan implemented a capital gains tax reform and reduced its flat rate in 2003. This study attempts to explain how this has contributed to the recent surge of individual trading, using three different methods of analysis. First, we perform a time-series analysis with the aggregate, market-level data. Second, we use firm-level, by-stock data to conduct a similar time-series analysis, as well as a panel data analysis. Third, we examine the price-change sensitivity of winners’ volume before and after the reform. The results clearly indicate that the tax cut has helped expand individual trading, as the average tax rate negatively correlates significantly with individual trading.     

The current global financial crisis: Do Asian stock markets show contagion or interdependence effects?

In the framework of the current global economic crisis, a pertinent question is whether the world economies are suffering from contagion or interdependence effects. With its origins in the US sub-prime mortgage market crisis starting at the end of 2007, when a loss of confidence by investors in the value of securitized mortgages resulted in a liquidity crisis, hard-hitting the banking system and rapidly spreading into the financial markets, the effects of the crisis were automatically reflected in the rest of the world economies. These effects become more severe as the rest of the world is facing economic and financial instability. Therefore, the American shock can be seen as the trigger that revealed the other economies’ own financial problems. The main finding of this paper shows that the US stock markets are not generating contagious effects into the Asian stock markets. However, strong evidence of volatility transmission derived from these economies’ interlinkages has been detected.