Banking in developing countries in the 1990s

During the 1990s commercial bank deposits and capital rose relative to GDP in the major developing countries. This rise largely reflected the dramatic fall in inflation of the 1990s and financial liberalization. But much of this growth in banks'loanable funds was absorbed by increased net holdings of central bank debt and of government debt. Much of the rise in government debt reflected post-crisis restructurings, notably in Brazil, Indonesia, and Mexico, but rising deficits also played a role. Bank intermediation between depositors and private sector borrowers remained limited in many countries despite financial liberalization. The post-crisis restructurings raise two important issues: the poor performance of loans that was revealed by the crisesand the future crowding-out that will result from the spreading-out of the cost of the crisis over time and the inability to retire the restructuring-related debt. The absorption of deposits in nonprivate sector credit, the growth of offshore finance of the private sector, and the poor performance of loans suggest a weakening of the link between the traditional measure of financial depth, M2/GDP, and economic growth and development. The changes in the 1990s also raise issues such as the potential for future deposit growth, the riskiness of bank portfolios, banks'increased dependence on government solvency, the access to credit for firms unable to access global markets, the foreign exchange exposure of countries, and the implications of the ongoing changes in regulation and supervision.Financial Intermediation,Payment Systems&Infrastructure,Economic Theory&Research,Banks&Banking Reform,Financial Crisis Management&Restructuring,Banks&Banking Reform,Financial Intermediation,Economic Theory&Research,Financial Crisis Management&Restructuring,Financial Economics

The growth in government domestic debt : changing burdens and risks

This paper analyzes the recent growth of government domestic debt, including central bank debt, using a new data base on government domestic debt in developing countries with large, open financial systems. On average, government domestic debt grew much faster than GDP between 1994 and 2004 and became larger than foreign debt. The rapid growth of domestic debt reflects financial crises, the growth of central bank debt and the greater attractiveness to governments of issuing domestic debt as well as the recent increase in demands for it. Both its attractiveness and the increased demands for it reflect the current benign international environment to some degree. The main risk of government debt, domestic or foreign, remains its overall size relative to a country's fiscal, financial, and political institutions. While government domestic debt can help the domestic private capital market, large domestic debt, like large external debt, has risks. For example, there can be"sudden stops"in the demand for domestic debt as well as in foreign lending. Governments need to be aware of the risks and burdens in domestic debt issue-crowding out small borrowers, transferring risks to banks when issuing longer maturity, fixed-interest domestic debt and reducing returns, and imposing risks on holders of pensions, annuities, and life insurance policies. Growth of central bank debt can divert central banks from pursuit of the objective of price stability.Debt Markets,Banks&Banking Reform,External Debt,,Emerging Markets

Inequalities for critical exponents in dd-dimensional sandpiles

Consider the Abelian sandpile measure on $\mathbb{Z}^d$, $d \ge 2$, obtained as the $L \to \infty$ limit of the stationary distribution of the sandpile on $[-L,L]^d \cap \mathbb{Z}^d$. When adding a grain of sand at the origin, some region, called the avalanche cluster, topples during stabilization. We prove bounds on the behaviour of various avalanche characteristics: the probability that a given vertex topples, the radius of the toppled region, and the number of vertices toppled. Our results yield rigorous inequalities for the relevant critical exponents. In $d = 2,$ we show that for any $1 \le k < \infty$, the last $k$ waves of the avalanche have an infinite volume limit, satisfying a power law upper bound on the tail of the radius distribution.Comment: 55 pages, 2 figures. Version 2 incorporates suggestions made by the referee. To appear in Electron. J. Proba

Where Have All the Young Trees Gone? A Big Picture Look at the Lack of Seedlings and Saplings in Urban Forests

We take a big picture look at the lack of seedlings, saplings and young trees in urban forests using our research in Forest Park in Portland, Oregon. Broshot, who measured vegetation at 25 sites in Forest Park, recorded significantly fewer live seedlings, saplings and young trees and significantly more dead seedlings, saplings and young trees in 2003 than in 1993. The percent mortality of western red cedar seedlings that were planted at 9 sites in Forest Park in 2005 ranged from less than 5% to over 70%. Investigations into the cause of seedling death has discounted predation by deer, elk or invertebrates, leaf disease, soil moisture, site aspect, and light as factors. The site with the highest mortality is located directly above the St John’s Bridge, suggesting air pollution. More recent work with lichens has provided evidence that nitrogen deposition related to air pollution may be the cause. We outline our past work and report preliminary results from our 2012 lichen survey analysis to support our hypothesis that pollution is a cause of the lack of young trees

Solving the Hamilton-Jacobi equation for gravitationally interacting electromagnetic and scalar fields

The spatial gradient expansion of the generating functional was recently developed by Parry, Salopek, and Stewart to solve the Hamiltonian constraint in Einstein-Hamilton-Jacobi theory for gravitationally interacting dust and scalar fields. This expansion is used here to derive an order-by-order solution of the Hamiltonian constraint for gravitationally interacting electromagnetic and scalar fields. A conformal transformation and functional integral are used to derive the generating functional up to the terms fourth order in spatial gradients. The perturbations of a flat Friedmann-Robertson-Walker cosmology with a scalar field, up to second order in spatial gradients, are given. The application of this formalism is demonstrated in the specific example of an exponential potential.Comment: 14 pages, uses amsmath,amssymb, referees' suggestions implemented, to appear in Classical and Quantum Gravit