Ecuador is shunning IMF credit facilities in favour of a long-term loan arrangement with China in exchange for oil.
Global architecture
IFI governance
News
IMF may face resource shortfall, warns Lagarde
In late July, IMF head Christine Lagarde raised the prospect that the IMF simply does not have enough money to confront the possibility of major sovereign debt crises in Europe.
Finance
News
Forty years is enough?
On the 40th anniversary of US default on its gold convertibility obligation, decreasing confidence in the dollar has strengthened calls to reform the international monetary system. The IMF is accused of ignoring inequities at the core of the system, while developing countries are increasingly seeking alternative regional arrangements.
Social services
News
Bondholders vs the public: Outcry over IMF-EU eurozone loans
The sovereign debt crisis in the eurozone, where Greece now needs a second round of loans, threatens major economies like Spain and Italy, but IMF-backed lending packages that demand deep austerity with insufficient attention to lenders' responsibilities anger the public.
Finance
News
IMF paper finds lobbying contributed to financial crisis
In May, three IMF staffers published a working paper with National Bureau of Economic Research,, A Fistful of Dollars: Lobbying and the Financial Crisis, pointing out the role of lobbying by financial firms for lax regulation which directly led to the 2008 subprime crisis.
Finance
Background
The IFC's approach to international trade finance
Trade finance refers to financing arrangements that support international trade transactions. It is one of the central parts of a new ten-year strategy paper on international trade currently being developed by the World Bank for the period between 2011 and 2021.
Finance
News
Brazil, India spurn IMF capital controls framework
Major developing countries have rebuffed the IMF's proposed framework on capital controls, or 'code of conduct' as it has been renamed. The board paper discussed in March drew fire from Brazil and India for being too prescriptive and suggesting that controls should only be used temporarily and as a last resort, but the policy will go ahead despite the acrimony.
Accountability
Background
IFC and Financial Intermediary Lending
Notes of meeting, Washington DC, April 15, 2011
Environment
Background
The Green Climate Fund: discussion of principles and design
Notes of meeting, Washington DC, April 15, 2011
Finance
News
The long road to nowhere? Disputes on the global financial architecture
While official ambitions are to refashion the global financial architecture, the IMF has yet to publish new thinking on capital flows, the G20 discussion on global imbalances is mired in dispute and the debate on a new monetary system may go in the wrong direction.
Featured briefings
6 April 2022
The Bretton Woods Observer: Spring 2022
8 December 2021
The Bretton Woods Observer: Winter 2021
8 November 2021
IMF surveillance and climate change transition risks
New briefing by ActionAid USA and the Bretton Woods Project highlights research showing that IMF policy advice has undermined a just energy transition since the Paris Agreement was signed.