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Australia has a history of few bank failures, even fewer financial crises, and its banking sector emerged from the global financial crisis relatively well.1 With an eye toward international developments, the Australian authorities have taken commendable steps to strengthen the financial safety net and crisis management framework over the last several years. The Government's well-coordinated response to the global financial crisis included adopting significant legislative changes in October 2008 to put in place guarantee arrangements for retail deposits, among other enhancements to the financial safety net and crisis management framework. Further improvements were made in June 2010 and the Government is currently pursuing additional legislative changes.

Central America, Panama, and the Dominican Republic coped well with the global financial crisis of 2008-09. The impact was generally less severe and shorter lived than in previous episodes, the balance of payments adjustment was orderly, and the stability of the financial system was not compromised. This resilience can be attributed to a large extent to the strengthening of the fiscal frameworks, monetary management, and financial reforms conducted in the years preceding the global crisis. Nevertheless, the region faces considerable challenges for the period ahead, including the need to raise medium term growth above historical levels and protect macroeconomic and financial stability. This book argues that meeting these challenges will have to come from within, in light of the anticipated modest demand growth from trade partners. Raising growth in the region will depend on the adoption of structural reforms that generate substantial productivity gains. Rebuilding fiscal space and securing debt sustainability will hinge on efforts to increase tax revenue and reorienting spending to social and investment priorities. In the non-officially dollarized economies, it will also be essential to strengthen the monetary policy frameworks to keep inflation low and increase exchange rate flexibility, and improve financial regulation and supervision.

This paper discusses key findings of the Detailed Assessment of Observance on the Insurance Core Principles on South Africa. Insurance regulatory and supervisory regime in South Africa is in transition. Currently, the Financial Services Board (FSB-SA) regulates the nonbanking financial services industry, including the insurance sector, in South Africa. With the goal of achieving a safer financial sector to serve South Africa better, the government has proposed major changes in the financial sector. The four policy objectives are: financial stability, consumer protection and market conduct, financial inclusion, and combating financial crime. Market realities in the insurance sector pose significant regulatory challenges, which are well recognized by the authorities.

This paper discusses findings of the Detailed Assessment of Implementation on the IOSCO (International Organization of Securities Commissions) Objectives and Principles of Securities Regulation in South Africa. Although South Africa's level of implementation of the IOSCO principles is complete in several areas, there is room for enhancement. The legal framework is robust and provides the authorities with broad supervisory, investigative, and enforcement powers. There are arrangements for on-site and off-site monitoring of regulated entities. The powers to cooperate with domestic and foreign counterparts are extensive. Accounting and auditing standards are high, as is the disclosure regime that applies to listed companies in practice.

Over the last decade, stress testing has become a central aspect of the Fund’s bilateral and multilateral surveillance work. Recently, more emphasis has also been placed on the role of insurance for financial stability analysis. This paper reviews the current state of system-wide solvency stress tests for insurance based on a comparative review of national practices and the experiences from Fund’s FSAP program with the aim of providing practical guidelines for the coherent and consistent implementation of such exercises. The paper also offers recommendations on improving the current insurance stress testing approaches and presentation of results.

In recent years, the IMF has released a growing number of reports and other documents covering economic and financial developments and trends in member countries.

This paper discusses findings of the Detailed Assessment of Observance of the Insurance Core Principles on Denmark. Insurance regulation in Denmark has a good level of compliance with the Insurance Core Principles. A particular strength of the Danish Financial Supervisory Authority's approach is its close focus on key risks in the sector and its readiness to require action by companies to address vulnerabilities. Regular, even daily monitoring of market risk sensitivities is carried out on life insurers' balance sheets. In nonlife insurance, regular testing of a number of key performance ratios helps to highlight potential weaknesses and to support early intervention. There is comprehensive oversight of the reinsurance programs of the nonlife companies in particular.

There has been significant discussion on the potential power of mobile-based technologies to provide unbanked populations with access to financial instruments and channels. Through the specific use of mobile money (m-money) services, for example, customers have accessed informational services, such as balance inquiries in their bank accounts, and transactional services, such as sending remittances to other people or paying for goods and services via their mobile phones. M-money has also been used by national governments to pay employee salaries and benefits. A key objective of this report is to discourage use of informal systems through the creation of a proportionate and not overly burdensome regulatory framework. Overly restrictive identification and verification processes in know-your-customer (KYC) policies, for example, may push users back to the informal financial system. The evolution of m-money in Africa and in non-African, low-income countries means that low-income and low-capacity countries are grappling with ways to ensure compliance with international Anti-Money Laundering and Combating the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT) standards. Thus, this report also provides some indications of how the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) standards can be applied to low-income clients within an m-money context. It does this by presenting various country practices and experiences to enable policy makers to identify the most appropriate solutions for their countries' individual circumstances.

For almost a decade, the IMF has been using stress tests to identify vulnerabilities across institutions that could undermine the stability of a country's financial system. This working paper focuses on the IMF's experience with stress testing in the Financial Sector Assessment Program (FSAP). It provides background on the nature of an FSAP and the role of macro stress testing within it. It also describes how the methodology of stress testing in FSAPs has been evolving and what are fairly common approaches now being used. Finally, it discusses the main strengths and challenges for future development of macro stress testing in FSAPs and provides an overview of stress testing practice in European FSAPs.

In recent years, the IMF has released a growing number of reports and other documents covering economic and financial developments and trends in member countries. Each report, prepared by a staff team after discussions with government officials, is published at the option of the member country.