White Papers
IMF Working Paper: Understanding China's 2024-25 Frontloading from the Lens of Product-Level Export Baskets
January 23, 2026-Summary
A striking feature of US-China trade tensions in mid-2025 is China's acceleration of exports to the US ahead of new tariff increases, a phenomenon we term export frontloading. To understand how this was achieved, we develop a factor model analytical framework to characterize China's product-level exports, across time and destinations, according to a set of latent export baskets.
Applying this to data from China's General Administration of Customs, we document the channels behind the 2024-25 episode and compare them with the 2018 US-China trade tensions. Our analysis points to broad-based adjustments across multiple dimensions in a manner not observed in 2018: (i) shipments to the US accelerated in the second half of 2024, possibly supported by the retention of intermediate inputs that facilitated a ramp-up in domestic production; (ii) from January 2025, domestic production slowed and shipments of intermediate inputs to Vietnam and other ASEAN economies accelerated, consistent with the relocation of export-oriented manufacturing following US tariffs; (iii) exporters prioritized shipments to the US through March 2025, reallocating flows away from third destinations with similar export profiles; and (iv) as shipments to the US fell sharply in April-May amid the escalation of reciprocal tariffs, the decline was offset by increased shipments to third destinations consistent with fulfilling previously deferred orders.
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Source: imf.org
IMF Working Paper: Structural Reforms in Saudi Arabia Since 2016
January 23, 2026-Summary
Since 2016, Saudi Arabia's Vision 2030 reforms have improved governance, business regulations, capital markets, the labor market, and the external sector, narrowing structural gaps with frontier economies and improving economic performance.
This paper summarizes progress, estimates the output impact of the reforms, notes challenges, and highlights future priorities for continued growth and diversification.
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Source: imf.org
IMF Working Paper: Structural Reforms in Saudi Arabia Since 2016
January 23, 2026-Summary
Canada is adjusting to the largest shift in North American trade policy since
NAFTA. The economy has been more resilient than initially feared, supported by
USMCA exemptions, resilient consumption, and policy cushioning.
Nonetheless, elevated trade uncertainty has weighed on exports, investment, and confidence, reinforcing long-standing weaknesses in productivity and competitiveness.
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Source: imf.org
IMF Working Paper: From Par to Pressure: Liquidity, Redemptions, and Fire Sales with a Systemic Stablecoin
January 16, 2026-Summary
Fiat-backed stablecoins are expanding, and their issuers may attain systemic relevance as reserve portfolios grow and as they become increasingly intertwined with financial markets. This paper analyzes the resulting risks and the design choices that can mitigate them. A detailed financial-economics discussion forms the core of the paper.
It is paired with a model that captures the feedback loop between a systemic stablecoin and financial markets: redemptions deplete reserves, may prompt asset sales, depress bond market prices, thereby erode a stablecoin issuer's solvency, and in turn amplify further redemptions. The model links design dials-capital and liquidity buffers, reserve composition, redemption gates, and others-to outcomes such as run frequency, fire sale intensity, and bond market volatility. The economics discussion and model analysis conclude that robust prudential design can substantially stabilize stablecoins and their surrounding market environment.
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Source: imf.org
IMF Working Paper: Market Access and High Spread Issuances
January 16, 2026-Summary
We investigate the factors determining emerging markets' likelihood to access international capital markets. First, we develop a simple model to outline the theoretical foundations of market access, highlighting the role of risk, spreads, net worth, and the cost of repaying debt. The model also shows a trade-off between risk insurance and moral hazard and underscores the relevance of unconventional instruments such as guarantees and macro-contingent debt.
Second, we estimate a random forest model to assess the key predictors of market access. We find that outstanding obligations, reserves, short-term external debt, EMBIG spreads and the size of the economy are key predictors of market access. Important non-linear effects include an inverted U-curve for the effect of spreads on likelihood of issuance; a positive relationship between likelihood of issuance and external debt at low spreads that turns negative at high spreads; and a high sensitivity to governance only for high spreads. Finally, we collect a novel dataset and examine the characteristics of high spread issuances, which are often unconventional and include guarantees, contingencies or collateral, in line with what theory predicts.
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Source: imf.org
IMF Working Paper The Economic Implications of the Energy Transition in Asia-Pacific
January 9, 2026--Summary
This paper examines the economic effects of the global energy transition and the large uncertainty surrounding future fossil fuel demand on countries in the Asia-Pacific region. Under the paper's baseline, coal demand is expected to shrink by 15 percent by 2035, although depending on global policy ambition and technological uptake, the decline could be as large as 45 percent.
Model simulations indicate that one-third of global coal capital stock and one-quarter of Asia-Pacific coal capital stock could become stranded if the speed of the transition is underestimated.
By contrast, global natural gas faces both upside and downside risks: when energy policy targets coal alone, natural gas extraction benefits, prompting an 18 percent rise in capital stock, whereas a fuel-agnostic transition would reduce gas capital stock by 16 percent. Impacts differ across countries, with high-cost coal exporters facing early losses, low-cost producers potentially gaining market share, and some gas exporters benefiting under select scenarios. At the same time, new growth opportunities will emerge for countries with strong critical mineral endowments and green energy potential.
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Source: imf.org
Four Futures for the New Economy: Geoeconomics and Technology in 2030
January 12, 2025-Four Futures for the New Economy: Geoeconomics and Technology in 2030 explores how the powerful interplay between geopolitical shifts and rapid technological change is reshaping the global economic landscape.
Produced as part of the Scenarios for the Global Economy Dialogue Series, the white paper presents four distinct futures for 2030 that emerge from different trajectories of geopolitical stability and technology adoption.
It offers a clear, structured lens to understand how forces such as artificial intelligence (AI) commercialization, supply chain reconfiguration, regulatory fragmentation and rising volatility may influence growth, labour markets, trade and business competitiveness.
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Source: World Economic Forum
The Multi-Trillion Dollar Growth Opportunity: New Report Shows Green Economy Expected to Surpass $7 Trillion in Annual Value by 2030
December 2, 2025-New report reveals that green revenues are growing twice as fast as conventional revenues on average, while companies involved in green markets often secure cheaper capital and typically enjoy valuation premiums.
Yet green markets are moving at different speeds, with mature solutions such as solar, wind, batteries and electric vehicles achieving cost competitiveness at the global level, while costly technologies such as low-carbon hydrogen and carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) require substantial support to bend the cost curve.
Businesses across industries are already benefiting from the strong growth of the green economy, the second-fastest growing sector over the past decade. A new report, Already a Multi-Trillion-Dollar Market: A CEO Guide to Growth in the Green Economy, finds that the green economy has already reached $5 trillion a year and is on track to exceed $7 trillion within the decade.
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Source: World Economic Forum (WEF)
IMF Working Paper Demographics and Consumption in Asia Toward 2050
November 21, 2025-Summary
What are the implications of demographics on total consumption and its sectoral composition in Asia toward 2050? Although the literature has studied total consumption and individual consumption categories separately, the research that studies both is scarce.
Using household consumption surveys from seven Asian economies and UN population projections, we find that (1) the compositional effects of demographics on total consumption can be large when middle-aged population changes rapidly, (2) due to aging, some categories, including education and transport, may grow slower than others, like health, and (3) the implications are uncertain due to factors like economic growth, fertility, and migration.
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Source: imf.org
IMF Working Paper Elections Matter: Capital Flows and Political Cycles
November 19, 2025-Summary
How should central banks explore tokenized reserves? Central banks are increasingly exploring how to make their reserves available to selected banks using distributed ledger technology, referred to as tokenized reserves.
This chapter covers policy objectives for tokenized reserves, operating models and roles of central banks, implications for monetary policy implementation, alternative solutions, and implementation strategies. Ultimately, central banks’ strategic decisions and policy options will vary across jurisdictions, reflecting differences in available resources, legal systems, and policy priorities.
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Source: imf.org
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