Capital flows to emerging markets have continued to be highly volatile since the Global Crisis. This column uses a new framework to show that country characteristics and policy responses matter for risks to future capital flows. It finds that good institutions support stable capital flows over the medium horizon, and while foreign exchange interventions seem to help mitigate downside risks to inflows caused by worsening global conditions, a tightening of capital flow measures in response to an adverse global shock is found to be counterproductive.
By Gaston Gelos, Lucyna Gornicka, Robin Koepke, Ratna Sahay and Silvia Sgherri