By Date

Freedom of choice, bitcoins and legal tender

This blog post by Adrian Blundell-Wignall builds on a working paper he published earlier this year titled "The Bitcoin Question: Currency versus Trust-less Transfer Technology".

Policy responses to the issue of implicit bank debt guarantees: OECD survey results

Bank regulatory reform measures are expected to limit the value of implicit bank debt guarantees, even if not plainly targeting such values. These survey results, covering 35 countries, show that no single policy is considered capable of fully eliminating the market perception that bank debt is “special”. A mixture of different and complementary measures is seen to hold greater promise.

Problems in the International Financial System

Since the 1980s, OECD investment-saving correlations – as an inverse measure of economic openness – indicate a very wide disparity of openness between the OECD and emerging market economies (EMEs) with an absence of open markets in the latter. Given the increasing weight of EMEs in the world economy, this paper warns that this pattern of growth with disparity of openness is ultimately unsustainable.

Launch of PISA Financial Literacy Assessment

The results of this first-ever assessment are a true call for action. We need to step up our global and common efforts to better identify the financial literacy needs of 15-year-olds and explore ways to improve this essential life skill, warned OECD Secretary-General.

Launch of the OECD PISA financial literacy assessment of students

The results of the first international assessment of 15-year-old students’ financial literacy competencies were presented in Paris on 9 July 2014.

OECD International Direct Investment Statistics 2014

APEC/OECD Seminar on long-term and stable financing

This seminar took place in Dalian, China, with discussions focusing on institutional investors and long-term financing and policy measures and initiatives to address constraints to infrastructure investment identified by APEC under the Chinese presidency.

Measurement and analysis of implicit guarantees for bank debt: OECD survey results

This report describes the key findings from responses by 35 countries to a survey on implicit guarantees. Policy makers have announced their intention to rein in the values of implicit guarantees so it is important to measure their value to help facilitate the task of assessing progress in reducing their value.

The Bitcoin Question: Currency versus Trust-less Transfer Technology

The financial crisis has led to a widespread loss of trust in financial intermediaries of all kinds, perhaps helping to open the way towards the general acceptance of alternative technologies. This paper briefly summarises the crypto-currency phenomenon, separating the ‘currency’ issues from the potential technology benefits.

2014 G20-OECD High-level roundtable on institutional investors and long-term investment

Singapore, 4 June 2014: This roundtable focused on how policymakers and investors can facilitate private sector infrastructure financing, as well as issues related to governance for institutional investors and the accounting treatment for long-term investment.