Nice example of IMF diplomatic language in the Burundi Article IV staff report. www.imf.org/en/publicati...

Barbados / IMF $257m precautionary SBA o/w $64m available immediately: "Efforts to support revenue mobilization & improve public financial mgmt remain priorities. Developing domestic debt markets will also be key to reducing rollover risks & mobilizing domestic savings." www.imf.org/en/news/arti...

Turkmenistan / IMF A4 mission: “The authorities are strongly recommended to enhance fiscal coverage, improve national account, price, and external sector statistics, develop labor market and social indicators, and increase the availability of economic data." www.imf.org/en/news/arti...

Senegal: "It [IMF mission] also welcomed institutional reforms to unify debt management functions as a critical corrective measure in the misreporting process. Further decisive action will be important to support progress toward resolving the case." www.imf.org/en/news/arti...

Senegal: "While an IMF programme would unlock financing, talks have hit several snags. The Fund has more pessimistic growth figures than the government and flagged concerns over revenue targets and fiscal consolidation." www.msn.com/en-us/news/o...

Angola / Sonangol: "To meet its frequent fundraising requirements, Sonangol is also in ongoing talks with Chinese financial institutions to secure a $4.8 billion loan to partly finance the construction of a new refinery in the Atlantic port of Lobito." www.msn.com/en-us/money/...

Microcosm of Ireland's journey along the Dixit-Stiglitz income growth product differentiation path.

Senegal: "In the interview published on Monday, Sonko said he had opposed “reckless restructuring”, arguing that it was not necessary because Senegal was meeting its debt repayment obligations and had good growth prospects." www.cnbcafrica.com/2026/senegal...

WSJ Capital Account column (Greg Ip): "The good news, according to [Kristin] Forbes [MIT], is that a plunge in stocks driven, for example, by disappointment in AI would effectively write down the IOUs the U.S. issued to foreigners to finance its deficits ..."

WSJ on the micro-finance backlash: "Two Cambodian human-rights groups have filed a complaint with the ombudsman of the International Finance Corp., alleging the World Bank’s private investment arm ignored its own standards ..."

Was on the road in Rochester NY yesterday; seeing this building brought home how the city is a microcosm of the American approach to business dynamics and innovation.

Nigeria / IMF Art IV staff report: "Based on the IMF’s definition of gross international reserves, reserves pledged under a securities lending arrangement (close to US$8 bn at end-2025) would be excluded from the official reserves figure reported by the central bank." www.imf.org/en/publicati...

Bahrain / prospectus for the new $1 billion Eurobond. Detailed discussion of the war impacts (see section 2026 Iran war), reference to the new UAE & Bahrain swap, and detailed description of the $60 billion total debt. www.londonstockexchange.com/news-article...

Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) -- really useful paper on experience and lessons learned from IADB participation in debt-for-nature conversions. publications.iadb.org/en/debt-natu...

Jamaica / new World Bank catastrophe bond ("CAT bond") prospectus. $200m maturing May 2030. Worth a close read is the hurricane modeling; nice table showing how the payout model would have worked for previous storms up to #Melissa. links.sgx.com/1.0.0/prospe...

Rwanda / IMF new ECF with $36m immediate disbursement: "Inflation, fiscal & current account pressures persist due to higher international oil & fertilizer prices driven by the war, & financing of large strategic investments." 14% CA deficit in 2026! www.imf.org/en/news/arti...

"Iran’s official statistics center announced last week that inflation had spiked compared with this period last year. The report said the price of cooking oil had increased by 430 percent, eggs by 345 percent, rice by 287 percent and milk by 139 percent." www.nytimes.com/2026/06/07/w...

"Cuba’s peso currency has fallen to around 620 to the dollar on the informal market, according El Toque, an independent Cuban news site that tracks the currency market." www.wsj.com/world/americ...

As an economist looking at the FIFA & NBA ticket price discourse, one heads back to the 1981 AER classic: Sherwin Rosen's The Economics of Superstars. Looking at that final sentence: social media has given the in-presence fan a complementary return to scale. home.uchicago.edu/~vlima/cours...

"Another factor keeping a lid on [crude oil] prices has been Trump’s relentless jawboning, making it hard for even the most bullish traders to hold long positions for prolonged periods of time." ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/why-oil...

Fiji / IMF Article IV staff report. Very clear case of climate impacts on debt in the debt sustainability analysis; with adaptation incorporated, debt does not decline in the baseline. www.imf.org/en/publicati...

The IMF and World Bank Group (WBG) are conducting a review of the joint IMF-WB Debt Sustainability Framework for Low-Income Countries (LIC-DSF). We're doing a public consultation; links at the below to the presentation and background note. www.worldbank.org/en/topic/fis...

Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank / useful roundup of financial operations in the latest SEC 18-K, nice table showing the 10 largest commitment countries. www.sec.gov/Archives/edg...

Useful timeline on Senegal's debt situation up to yesterday's confirmation by IMF of another technical mission soon. www.cnbcafrica.com/2026/senegal...

From the latest round of US Treasury OFAC Iran sanctions: "Like many of his peers, Mehrdad Geramian Nik also maintains foreign citizenship in Dominica, a convenience often obtained through citizenship-by-investment programs ..."

AFP: "Mercer took over management of the $200 million Tuvalu Trust Fund in 2022. It has since invested in funds that include Indian energy giant Reliance Industries, which owns the largest oil refinery in the world, ..."

US Treasury OFAC sanctions update, addition to the specially designated nationals (SDN) list: the President of Cuba and his wife. ofac.treasury.gov/recent-actio...

South Africa: "As coal plants close down, [David] Hallowes [groundWork] said, “major jobs should come from mine closures and rehabilitation and the rehabilitation of catchments. A lot of those jobs would actually be jobs appropriate to miners.” www.cnbcafrica.com/2026/green-j...

Zambia. There is a tender offer for the 2053 step-up Eurobond that is running into difficulties. The tender price has been increased, with a note that: www.londonstockexchange.com/news-article...

"[Robin] Mills [Qamar Energy] said that, while the [KSA East-West ] pipeline could be expanded further, Saudi Arabia also needs to upgrade export-handling facilities, such as storage tanks and loading pumps, at the Red Sea port of Yanbu to handle the larger flow." www.wsj.com/world/middle...

Interesting paper on parallel currency markets in Nigeria using 9 years of daily data forthcoming at NBER Int'l Seminar on Macro by Toni Oki & Olalekan Bello. Key storyline is parallel market affecting import prices, official market affecting expected inflation. www.nber.org/conferences/...

Daniel Yergin: "Any [oil market] intervention should be done with great care. Allowing markets to balance supply and demand, rather than trying to circumvent them, is a basic lesson of energy security." www.wsj.com/opinion/ener...

Notable point coming from the World Bank commodity price "pink sheet" for May: the divergence of rising metals prices from falling precious metals prices. blogs.worldbank.org/en/opendata/...

Ethiopia / IMF ECF 5th review SLA: "The war in the Middle East was a significant external shock that disrupted trade, causing temporary fuel shortages and sharp increases in the price of imported fuel and fertilizer. Even so, economic activity appears robust, ..."

From the article, a JP Morgan quote on China: "They argue the decline [in oil consumption] does not appear to be the product of a formal government conservation campaign but rather a quiet economic choice by consumers."

Egypt / pricing supplement for issuance of $1b in social bonds, 2034 maturity, 7.625% yield. www.londonstockexchange.com/news-article...

Zambia: related to last week's announcement of a buyback of the 2053 step-up note issued as part of the debt restructuring, the associated African Development Bank loan is described as a "debt for energy conversion." www.londonstockexchange.com/news-article...

“The world is under-allocated to emerging markets, capital flows need to return to this universe to rebalance portfolios,” said Bradley Wickens, partner, chief investment officer and chief executive officer of Broad Reach." ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/em-reco...

"A key test will be whether the EU classifies Morocco as “European” under the Commission’s recently proposed Industrial Accelerator Act, which is designed to protect the bloc’s rapidly eroding industrial base."

DR Congo / Ebola: "Gold miners and people fleeing rebel conflict stream in and out of Mongbwalu, providing an excellent vector for the spread of the virus." www.nytimes.com/2026/05/30/w...

Vietnam & USA / State Bank of Vietnam and US Treasury macroeconomic dialogue. The standard template of renewal of IMF Articles of Agreement promises on monetary and exchange policies and a transparency commitment from SBV: home.treasury.gov/news/press-r...

Sabine Mauderer, first deputy governor of the Deutsche Bundesbank: "From a policy perspective, the pace of the [energy] transition rests with governments, not central bankers."

Zambia / tender offer for the 2053 step-up notes ($1.36bn face value) issued as part of the debt restructuring, in parallel a new loan of $600m from African Development Bank to finance the offer. www.londonstockexchange.com/news-article...

"But if the war continued indefinitely, “all bets are off”, Tabaqchali [AFC Iraq Fund] warned, adding that Iraq’s vast public sector payroll could be hit if the crisis dragged on — another potential source of political instability."

Ethiopia / Eurobond restructuring: "The government added it will “assess all its available options to resolve the current situation, including a potential exchange offer or other market transaction relating to the 2024 Notes.” www.cnbcafrica.com/2026/ethiopi...

Sri Lanka / IMF EFF combined reviews staff report. Not sure about the logic of the argument that, yes, the macro-linked bonds (MLB) paid off because of a downward biased macro projection but it's OK because the macro turned out even better than the MLB trigger ... www.imf.org/en/publicati...

Sri Lanka / IMF EFF combined reviews staff report. "Of the US$28 billion in external debt under the restructuring perimeter at end-2023, only US$0.3 billion remains to be restructured." www.imf.org/en/publicati...

NYT excellent article on how to understand the dropping of RCP8.5 from IPCC climate scenarios, with closing quote from @madisoncondon.bsky.social:

"In those better times, tourism accounted for about 8% of Cuba’s roughly $30 billion economy, employed hundreds of thousands and was a key source of foreign currency, says Pavel Vidal Alejandro, a Cuban economist." www.wsj.com/world/americ...

Senegal: " [Thalia] Petousis [Allan Gray] warned that if only foreign-currency debt was restructured while local currency debt was not, “the risks are that realised haircuts could be steeper than what is currently priced.” www.cnbcafrica.com/2026/firebra...