01812cas a2200253 a 4500 AALejournalIMF001819 230101c9999 xx r poo 0 0eng d 5.00 USD 9781451848298 1018-5941 BD-DhAAL BD-DhAAL Flood, Robert. Holding International Reserves in an Era of High Capital Mobility / Robert Flood, Nancy Marion. Washington, D.C. : International Monetary Fund, 2002. 1 online resource (53 pages) IMF Working Papers <strong>Off-Campus Access:</strong> No User ID or Password Required <strong>On-Campus Access:</strong> No User ID or Password Required Electronic access restricted to authorized BRAC University faculty, staff and students Why do countries hold so much international reserves? Global reserve holdings (excluding gold) were equivalent to 17 weeks of imports at the end of 1999. That is almost double what they were at the end of 1960 and about 20 percent higher than they were at the start of the 1990s. In this paper we study countries' reserve holdings in light of both the increased financial volatility experienced in the last decade and diminished adherence to fixed exchange rates. We find that buffer-stock reserve models work about as well in the modern floating-rate period as they did during the Bretton Woods regime. During both periods, however, the models' fundamentals explain only a small portion (10-15 percent) of reserves volatility. Mode of access: Internet Marion, Nancy. IMF Working Papers; Working Paper ; No. 2002/062 Full text available on IMF http://elibrary.imf.org/view/journals/001/2002/062/001.2002.issue-062-en.xml IMF e-Library