The future and dynamics of global systemically important banks

The purpose of this paper is to analyse some of the issues associated with supervision and regulation of global systemically important banks, G-SIB. The paper highlights the importance of managing liquidity risk and creating a global financial system that can minimise regulatory arbitrage by large financial institutions. The paper argues that, unlike some industries such as the airline industry in which risk has been contained and yet the size and capacity of aircrafts have increased, in the banking system, less progress has been made to contain financial risk and allow large banks to expand their global activities. The paper argues that G-SIB are able to continue remaining large provided that a globally integrated financial system ensures effective global supervision of these large banks. The paper compares the US banking crises in the 19th century and the subsequent emergence of the US Federal Reserve System to the possibility of establishing a world central bank and a global supervisory board. Such new global institutions will have the capacity to reduce regulatory arbitrage, increase effective supervision, reduce systemic and liquidity risk and create a more stable global financial system.     

Global financial services and a global single currency

The purpose of this paper is to highlight the evolution of financial institutions in the context of increasingly volatile foreign exchange markets. The paper discusses the importance of the formation of a single currency in the US in the 19th century and the formation of the Euro in the 20th century for reducing volatility in foreign exchange markets that have assisted financial institutions’ international business expansion. The paper also considers some of the key assumptions of an optimal currency theorem such as labour mobility and argues that in the 21st century, more comprehensive financial market integration and a single global currency could emerge, provided that capital mobility and hence foreign capital flows continue meeting labour in the host countries for production rather than the other way round.     

Can an Asia Pacific Community,similar to the European Community,emerge?

The purpose of this paper is to analyse whether the Asia Pacific region could form a union similar to the one now established in Europe. To this end, it analyses some of the major challenge faced by the US prior to its union in the 19th century and the way countries such as France and Germany contributed to the formation of the EU, despite their past animosity. The paper proposed a two tier system for the emergence of a union in the Asia Pacific region in which all countries could become part of a regional framework for regional security and free trade and some of the more advanced countries in the region could start the process of financial integration and invite other member countries to join them over time. The paper argues that in the 2st century, unlike the claim of the “currency optimum theory,” there is no need for labour mobility amongst Asian countries for the formation of a union in this region and hence Australia should not expect millions of workers from China to migrate there. The paper argues that the role of Japan and China in the process of regional integration has been underestimated, due to the claim that the former is a monoculture and the latter is too nationalistic. The paper highlights how diversity in the region could be seen as a strength in the Asia Pacific region. It also shows how the process of globalisation has already overcome differences in culture, religion and race which used to be stumbling blocks for more regional or global integration. The paper argues that a union in the Asia Pacific region would reduce “home bias” for international capital flows and hence there would be significant financial transformation of countries in this region.     

Globalisation,growth and institutions

We are currently in the second wave of globalisation. Despite the fact that over the past two decades a number of national financial and other barriers have been removed, there are still a number of national, regional and global factors that are slowing down the process of financial globalisation from trickling down to all parts of the world. This paper briefly discusses the process of globalisation and considers the human development index including education as a way of measuring economic growth and financial wealth in different parts of the world. The paper analyses the process of financial globalisation and the way some nations have become the recipients of more foreign capital than others. As a way of seeing the importance of both national and international economic and financial integration as important ingredients for sustained economic growth, the process of financial integration in Europe is analysed as a model for acceleration of the process of globalisation and sustained economic growth in this century. The 21st century is referred to as the Pacific century and hence financial integration in the Asia Pacific region (APEC) could create a new impetus for the EU to increase its internal integration including its fiscal policies as a way of remaining competitive in the global economy.     

Financial challenges for the new millennium

This article highlights the main issues raised in 13 articles that were selected from papers presented at the 12th Australasian Finance and Banking Conference held in Sydney in December 1999. It also analyses the issues related to global financial coordination and integration for the new millennium. It highlights the cost associated with foreign exchange volatility and the significance of macroeconomic coordination at the global level for further integration of the financial market. It also highlights the challenges facing international institutions such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the need for global financial institutions with greater influence, which could address the major financial challenges facing the new millennium.     

Globalisation and the role of effective international institutions

Since empirical research has demonstrated that a sound financial system drives economic growth and the reverse causality alone is not causing this relationship, one can well extend this causal relationship to a global financial system and also argue that those factors that are limiting stronger economic growth and financial globalisation are partly related to deficiencies of the current global financial system. In the same way that some studies have argued for the significance of high quality national institutions as a way of addressing some of the national social and economic bottlenecks and also as a way of creating the right environment for sustained economic growth and integration into the global markets, high quality international institutions with adequate mandates and effective executive power can also influence the process of regional and global financial integration. These international institutions can accelerate the process of national institutional reforms. The paper argues that a number of financial barriers limiting financial globalisation have in essence international, regional and national components and hence without a globally coordinated strategy and framework to have parallel reforms at three levels, the limits to financial globalisation may remain for the foreseeable future.     

Financial services in an increasingly integrated global financial market

This paper discusses aspects of global financial services. As part of financial globalisation, financial institutions have evolved both nationally and internationally. FDI is becoming an important vehicle for multinational banks to enter developing countries. This in turn is changing the composition of trade in financial services. The experience of regional integration in Europe and the emergence of large multinational European banks signal a new era of global competition and consolidation of financial institutions. Home bias in international financial services is much less where financial integration is taking place. With financial globalisation, one should expect more diversification of ownership of multinational banks around the world, particularly when China and India are now able to have strategic investment in some of the key investment banks around the world. Financial globalisation requires stronger and more effective international institutions as a way of monitoring the activities of multinational financial institutions at both the national and international levels.     

The global financial crisis and the evolution of markets, institutions and regulation

This paper analyses the recent global financial crisis in the context of the dual processes of market development and regulation. It discusses how, in the absence of a globally integrated financial framework, past and present regulations and interventions in reaction to national and global financial crises did not resolve the cross border regulatory arbitrage. The paper discusses how crises often lead to the emergence of new national and international institutions. It also analyses the proposed “new global framework” that needs to be in place if the policy recommendations contained in the G20 communiqué are going to be effectively implemented. The paper argues that unless international agreements are ratified by all nations and become part of national rules and laws, the presence of regulatory arbitrage and the lack of adequate cross border information and data may prevent the global economy from addressing the underlying causes of the recent global financial crisis. The paper also discusses the evolution of central banks and their new role in contributing to global financial stability. The paper argues that the recent global financial crisis has provided a unique opportunity to go beyond economic data and attempt to capture cross border financial data and other information that could assist international and national institutions to measure and manage financial risk more effectively. Finally, the paper discusses “too big to fail” and argues that only an internationally integrated financial system will make large banks global, both when operational and in the event of insolvency.     

东亚区域经济合作的战略背景分析

20世纪90年代和21世纪初,世界经济格局发生剧烈变化。一方面,科学技术进步推动着经济全球化,而经济全球化又推动着经济一体化;另一方面,全球区域经济一体化组织风起云涌,北美自由贸易区建立和向南美延伸,欧盟东扩。与大西洋两岸区域经济合作的蓬勃发展相比,东亚区域合作显得非常滞后。没有区域经济合作,东亚各国在全球竞争中就会处于劣势,在国际经济规则制定过程中就会永远处于较低地位。     

Convergent synergies in the global market for corporate control

We investigate the informational role of the takeover premium as a forward looking price to expected synergies in the global market for corporate control. We find that premiums paid in the global market for corporate control are clustered in waves and driven to some extent by the US premium. International takeover premiums have become more responsive to US premiums as the globalization process evolved over time. Short-run divergent dynamics due to idiosyncratic or country-specific factors have become less severe, which suggests that expected synergies have become increasingly integrated in the global market for corporate control. Furthermore, we find that the region’s takeover premiums typically become more responsive to US takeover premiums when US economic conditions are relatively weak, when the US monetary policy is restrictive, when US credit risk is high, and when the region’s corporate governance (as measured by legal system quality and accounting quality) is high.     

Multiple equilibria in the dynamics of financial globalization: The role of institutions

Recent research underscores the dual role played by institutions for deciphering the financial globalization – growth nexus. On the one hand, for capital account liberalization to be growth enhancing, a critical level of local institutional quality is needed. On the other hand, increased integration in the global financial system strengthens these countries’ institutions. We argue that this complex relationship may give rise to multiple equilibria in the dynamics of financial global integration: haphazard capital account liberalization may lead to situations where well integrated nations become increasingly better integrated, while poorly integrated nations are left at the margin. To test this hypothesis, we check whether controlling for the quality of institutions eliminates conditional convergence of global financial integration. Our results confirm that growth in financial integration is non-linear, and that this non-linearity disappears once we control for the quality of institutions.     

加强合作 促进发展 实现共赢——在第十八届亚太会计师大会上的主题演讲

李勇会长指出,中国注册会计师行业围绕国家经济发展战略需求,特别是中国经济日益融入世界经济体系对注册会计师行业提出的新要求,坚持开放、台作、共旅的精神.以国际化发展为导向。全面建立国际趋同的执业标准体系.培养国际化的行业人才队伍,培育具有国际竞争力的事务所,开拓适应市场需求的新业务领城,建立支律行业和事务所发展的信息系统。全面提升行业服务经济社会发展的能力和水平,构建面向未来的注册会计师行业发展新格局.     

International financial integration in Asian bond markets

With the development of international financial market, the degree of international financial integration increased significantly during the late 1980s and 1990s. A key factor underlying this process was the increased globalization of investments seeking a higher rate of return and the opportunity to diversify risk internationally. In this paper, we investigate the degree of international financial integration in Asia by examining the relationships amongst Asian bond markets by employing the advanced econometric technique of cointegration of error correction vectors. In other words, we propose the answers to the following questions. Firstly, what is the degree of international financial integration in Asian bond markets? Secondly, does this degree of integration significantly change after the 1997 Asian financial crisis?This study has a strong implication for investors, in particular, from the perspective of Australian or US investors, whether they do benefit from investing in Asian bond markets. In addition, understanding the extent of financial integration and monitoring its progress in the region is important for Asian central banks. In addition, increased international financial integration promotes financial development and hence enhances economic performance in the region.     

Measuring financial market integration over the long run: Is there a U-shape?

Using long time series for sovereign bond markets of fifteen industrialized economies from 1875 to 2009, I find that financial market integration by the end of the 20th century was higher than in earlier periods and exhibited a J-shaped trend with a trough in the 1920s. The main reason for the higher financial integration seen today is the recent extensive globalization. Around the turn of the 20th century, countries frequently drifted apart. Conversely, in recent years, the bond markets of most countries have moved together. Both policy variables and the global market environment play a role in explaining the time variation in integration, while “unexplained” changes in the overall level of country risk are also empirically important. My methodology, based on principal components analysis, is immune to outliers and accounts for global and country-specific shocks and, hence, can capture trends in financial integration more accurately than standard techniques such as simple correlations.     

A geographically weighted approach to measuring efficiency in panel data: The case of US saving banks

This paper discusses a new approach to controlling for the environment when estimating efficiency. In response to the literature on the international comparison of bank efficiency, we draw the attention to a local dimension of comparison. By introducing geographical weights and estimating local frontiers for each US savings bank in the 2001–09 period, we find that the bank technical performance is higher for most banks in comparison to a fixed-effects approach. This result highlights the importance of taking into account the local environment and constraints while analyzing banks’ performance, so as not to consider the factors that are exogenous to these institutions as inefficiencies. Further analysis could improve the weighs calculation by employing other measures of interconnectedness besides geographical distance.     

Inter- and intra-regional stock market relations for the GCC bloc

This paper examines the patterns of information transmission for equity markets in the seven Gulf Cooperation Council countries over the period from 2004 to 2019. Using weekly data, correlations and spillovers both within the region and from the US, the EU and Japan are modelled through the Dynamic Conditional Correlation-GARCH model and the Diebold-Yilmaz spillover index. While GCC markets exhibit increasing correlations with, primarily, the EU and, to a lesser extent, the US, they nonetheless remain relatively less interlinked globally. Our findings support significant return and volatility spillovers from the EU and the US to the GCC markets, with stronger spillovers from the EU. Intra-regionally, the UAE is the main transmitter and receiver of spillovers between the GCC and world markets. Furthermore, we see evidence of a decoupling pattern within the GCC countries, with notable segmentation in the markets of Bahrain and Kuwait.     

An open-economy macro-finance model of international interdependence: The OECD,US and the UK

This paper develops a multi-country macro-finance model to study international economic and financial linkages. This approach models the economy and financial markets jointly using both types of data to throw light on such issues. The world economy is modelled using data for the US and aggregate OECD economies as well as the US Treasury bond market using latent variables to represent a common inflation trend and a US real interest rate factor. We find strong evidence of global effects on both the US and UK, calling into question the standard closed economy macro-finance specification. These economic linkages also help to explain the co-movement of yields in the US and UK Treasury bond markets.     

证券交易所的可竞争性与我国证交所的发展

在技术与制度激变的全球化时代,证券交易所越来越成为了金融业中的竞争实体,21世纪初全球证交所大范围的整合并购,要求我们对于证券交易所的定位与发展应该有新的认识。本文从证交所在市场的中可竞争性出发,探讨我国证券交易所的未来发展。     

The U.S. left behind? Financial globalization and the rise of IPOs outside the U.S.

From 1990 to 2011, the share of world IPO activity by non-U.S. firms increased because of financial globalization and because of a decrease in U.S. IPO activity. Financial globalization reduces the impact of national institutions on domestic IPO activity and enables more non-U.S. firms from countries with weak institutions to go public with a global IPO. U.S. IPO activity does not benefit from financial globalization. Compared to other countries, the rate of small-firm IPO activity in the U.S. is abnormally low in the 2000s. This abnormally low rate cannot be explained by the regulatory changes of the early 2000s.     

Regional motors of the global economy

The thesis of this article is that world capitalism is moving into a phase of development marked by an intensified regionalization of production overlaid by—and rooted in—a global division of labour. In this process, a significant reallocation of economic coordination and steering functions is occurring, away from the sovereign state, up to the international and down to the regional levels. The historical development of the global capitalist system over the post-World-War-II years is reviewed. The mechanism underlying the growth and spread of large agglomerations of productive activity throughout the world are then elucidated. The combined processes of global integration and regional concentration of economic activity raise important questions about appropriate forms of regulation in the new world order, and some evolving tendencies are described. The article ends on a speculative note in which the possible emergence of something like a worldwide system of city-states at the dawn of the 21st century is contemplated.