The imbalances within the Euro-zone were the main reasons of the crisis that had led to the growing budget deficits in the Southern Europe resulting in the accumulation of unsustainable debt. The imbalances were caused by the declining competitiveness of the South vis-s-vis the North. The main causes of the declining competitiveness are the differences in unit labor costs invoked by different regulations concerning the labor markets in the Euro-zone countries and the diverging levels of productivity, which is liked with the different levels of technological advancement. The contributing factor is the institutional imperfections of the EMU, that did not allow the countries in Southern Europe to restore their competitiveness by traditional means without providing them with alternatives.

This paper performs an analysis of rating agencies and evaluates their importance for financial markets and economic policy. The importance of rating agencies and their ratings is assessed based on two criteria -- independence and accuracy of ratings, both criteria are analysed in detail from different views throughout this paper. Independence of rating agencies is considered in terms of historical context and the most important development milestones and trends, in terms of market positioning and demand for services of rating agencies, in terms of ownership structures and financing models. Accuracy of ratings is considered by historical analyses of sovereign ratings from the times of the Asian financial crisis, the European debt crisis and sovereign debt defaults and restructuralisations since 1990. In the issue of independence, the paper has revealed several risk factors, mainly in relation to financing model "issuer pays". In the issue of sovereign rating accuracy, the paper has come to a conclusion that rating agencies were only able to identify the most visible negative trends -- defaults and restructuralisations of debts in countries, where the problems had developed gradually. On the other hand, in surprising and sudden cases such as the Asian financial crisis and the European debt crisis, rating agencies were suprised just like the wider investor's public.

The thesis is devoted to the position of rating agencies in the financial markets. The main aim is to predict the position of these companies, which is currently mainly influenced by the European politicians. Politicians criticize them and try to limit their power. The essence of this thesis is to summarize the reasons for their criticism, focusing on reduction of sovereign ratings. Then it's discussed a downgrading the USA and France. For the first time in a history they lost their AAA rating. The last chapter is devoted to the possible position of rating agencies. The first option is the establishment of the European rating agency, the other one is tightening regulation and the last is a situation if the rating agencies were abolished.

This master's thesis describes economic and socio-political development of Argentina from 1976 up until the current situation. The last chapter introduces the perspectives of the future development as well. During this period, Argentina experienced a lot of changes when the country switched from policy of ISI to neoliberalism which was the main policy of Argentina from 1976 until the default in 2001, with the exception of Alfonsín's presidency. The thesis deals with the main causes of this default. The next part of the work examines what led the country to the economic recovery after 2002 and explains the changes that have occured during the period of Kirchnerism.

Si la crise de 2008 a plongé l'économie dans une période difficile et pleine d'incertitudes, elle peut du moins se vanter d'avoir enclenché un chantier des réformes de la sphère financière. Dans un contexte où la régulation internationale relève de plus en plus du soft law, le Comité de Bâle joue un rôle important dans l’élaboration de règles permettant de construire un secteur bancaire plus sûr d’autant plus que les règles de Bâle III ont pour objectif de rétablir la confiance dans le système bancaire et financier qui fut ébranlé, mais aussi d’éviter la survenance d’une crise à l’avenir. À l’aide de règles plus strictes et d’outils innovants, la régulation est allée plus loin que par le passé. Toutefois, les dangers découlant d’un contournement des règles prudentielles par les banques sont bel et bien présents. La question de l’efficacité des stratégies de régulation prudentielle qui peut être de nouveau débordée et prise de court par une autre crise est sérieusement posée. Les réponses réglementaires arrivent généralement a posteriori, alors qu’il faudrait agir en amont. Certes, les États ont souvent porté secours à leurs banques mais ils n’auront pas forcément les mêmes moyens à chaque nouvelle crise. Dans ce contexte, les problématiques liées à l’interconnexion entre risque souverain et risque bancaire ainsi qu’aux politiques d’austérité ont été abordées, tout comme les questions concernant les agences de notations, la titrisation ou encore les partenariats public-privé qui ont entre autres été analysés. Dans un monde qui change, de nouveaux défis se présentent et un regard vers des horizons plus lointains nous a amenés à nous intéresser à la nouvelle politique de déréglementation du nouveau président des États-Unis, mais il était aussi opportun de s’intéresser aussi au Liban dont le système bancaire a réussi à échapper à la crise mondiale. De plus, le système bancaire et financier devra sans doute faire avec des phénomènes comme le « bitcoin » ou la « finance islamique », qui malgré leur fragilité, sont en développement. Finalement, la thèse vise à montrer les limites du système actuel et des mesures envisagées. / While the 2008 crisis has plunged the economy into a difficult period full of uncertainty, it can at least boast of having launched reforms of the financial sphere. In a context where international regulation is increasingly a matter of soft law, the Basel Committee plays an important role in developing rules to build a more secure banking sector, especially as the Basel III rules aim to restore confidence in the banking and financial system that was shaken, but also to prevent the occurrence of a new crisis. By means of stricter rules and innovative tools, regulation has gone further than in the past. However, the dangers arising from the circumvention of prudential rules by banks are indeed present. The question of the effectiveness of prudential regulation strategies, which may again be overwhelmed and taken aback by another crisis, is seriously raised. Regulatory responses usually come afterwards, whereas action should be taken upstream. Countries have often helped their banks, but they will not necessarily have the same resources in every new crisis. In this context, issues related to the interconnection between sovereign and banking risks and austerity policies were discussed, as were issues related to rating agencies, securitization and public-private partnerships. In a changing world, new challenges arise and a look at further horizons has led us to take an interest in the new deregulation policy of the new President of the United States, but it was also timely to take an interest in Lebanon, whose banking system has managed to escape the global crisis. Moreover, the banking and financial system will probably have to deal with phenomena such as "bitcoin" or "Islamic finance", which, despite their fragility, are developing. Finally, the thesis aims to show the limits of the current system and the measures envisaged.

Depuis la crise financière de 2008, la Commission a actualisé régulièrement les règles de l'Union européenne en matière d'aide d'Etat, en adoptant des « communications liées à la crise », dans l’objectif d’instaurer un cadre général de résolution des difficultés du secteur bancaire et de fournir des orientations détaillées concernant les critères de compatibilité avec le marché intérieur. Dans le cadre de la gestion de la crise des dettes souveraines, le déploiement des solidarités financières et monétaires, perçues comme des transcendances de l’intérêt général, a constitué, dans le champ substantiel, des conditions de légalité des actions étatiques et européennes en matière de stabilité et d’assistance financière. En outre, les réponses institutionnelles et étatiques se sont traduites par des réformes successives visant à remodeler le cadre réglementaire européen, en vue d’un renforcement du volet préventif du PSC, ainsi que d’une action corrective plus rigoureuse des politiques économiques et budgétaires dans le volet correctif. Par ailleurs, l’accumulation des déséquilibres macroéconomiques et financiers a révélé l’importance de renforcer les instruments de coordination et de surveillance des politiques structurelles et conjoncturelles, afin que les politiques budgétaires soient à long terme bénéfiques pour la croissance des Etats membres de l’Union. En outre, la contagion et les impacts de la crise bancaire de 2008 sur les marchés d'obligations ont conduit l’Union européenne à renforcer les exigences prudentielles applicables aux institutions financières et à adopter des mesures décisives en matière de réglementation et de surveillance financière. / Since the financial crisis of 2008, the Commission has regularly updated the EU rules on State aid, adopting « crisis-related communications », with the intention of establishing a general framework for Resolution of the difficulties of the banking sector and to provide detailed guidance on the criteria for compatibility with the internal market. In the management context of the sovereign debt crisis, the deployment of financial and monetary solidarities, perceived as supremacies of the general interest, constituted, in the substantial field, conditions for the legality of State and European Stability and financial assistance. In addition, institutional and governmental responses have resulted in successive reforms intended at reshaping the European regulatory framework, with a view to strengthening the preventive arm of the Stability Growth Pact (SGP), as well as corrective and rigorous economic action. Moreover, the accumulation of macroeconomic and financial imbalances has revealed the importance of strengthening the instruments for coordinating and monitoring structural and cyclical policies in order, for the budgetary policies to be beneficial for the growth of the Member States in the long term, Union. Moreover, the spread and the impact of the banking crisis of 2008 on the bond markets that have led the European Union to strengthen prudential requirements for financial institutions, and to adopt decisive measures in the field of regulation and financial supervision.

This study investigates the cryptocurrency called bitcoin. A cryptocurrency is a type of currency that depends on cryptography to issue new units instead of depending on government decree like fiat currencies. The study will first explain some of the technical details that make bitcoin work. This is necessary to lay groundwork to get to the actual aim of the study, namely investigating the economic aspects of bitcoin. The study will evaluate bitcoin, and other cryptocurrencies, along with fiat currencies against certain definitions. In the process it will introduce a new subclass of cryptocurrency - the sovereign cryptocurrency. Bitcoin’s implied monetary policy will also be discussed, as well as the problems it creates for central banks. A hypothesis on the behaviour of the bitcoin price will be explained and research will be provided to support the acceptance of the hypothesis. Using this hypothesis, a stochastic pricing model for bitcoin will be derived. Arbitrage trading strategies will also be provided that explain certain price constraints that operate in the bitcoin market. The dissertation will also introduce a means to improve the anonymity of a user of bitcoin and will reason that improvements such as these and others will increase the use of bitcoin. Therefore, improvements to anonymity will increase the economic relevance of bitcoin and increase its competitive edge over the traditional banking system. It will be reasoned, based on the possible problems created by bitcoin’s monetary policy, as well as the growth projections implied by the stochastic pricing model, and the increased economic relevance due to improvements in anonymity, that central banks would need to create their own cryptocurrency that conforms to certain requirements – the previously introduced sovereign cryptocurrency. The study will conclude by explaining the technical changes needed for a fork of bitcoin to become a sovereign cryptocurrency, as well as a mathematical model to control the monetary policy of the sovereign cryptocurrency. As its aim, adaptive monetary policy will have stable prices for the economy using the sovereign cryptocurrency to price its goods and services. Please note, that while every effort was made to use published references, the field of cryptocurrencies is very young and changing constantly. Thus, most publications on the subject are simply placed on websites on the internet. This is especially true for the work relating to the founding of the field, and the data sources of the operation of the cryptocurrencies. Therefore a lot of the references do refer to websites on the internet. / Dissertation (MSc)--University of Pretoria, 2019. / Mathematics and Applied Mathematics / MSc / Unrestricted

[pt] O presente estudo tem por objetivo construir um modelo que permita a categorização dos fatores que geram o conceito de Risco Soberano e que defina as variáveis que compõem cada um deles. Para isso, usam-se os métodos estatísticos conhecidos como Análise Fatorial e Análise dos Componentes Principais. Apresenta-se como resultado do trabalho um modelo que é simultaneamente conciso - pelo pequeno número de variáveis que o compõem, em contraposição ao número elevado citado na literatura sobre o tema - e eficiente - uma vez que ele permite montar um Índice de Risco Soberano compatível com os ratings das principais agências internacionais e com os retornos de títulos soberanos. Utilizou-se o Coeficiente de Correlação de Postos de Spearman para proceder a comparação entre a ordenação de países pelo índice proposto e as ordenações derivadas dos ratings e dos retornos dos títulos. / [en] This study is designed to build a model which enables the categorization of factors that not only originates the concept of Sovereign Risk but also defines the variables that compound each factor. To fulfill such an objective, statistical methods known as Factor Analysis and Principal Component Analysis are employed. As result of this work, a model is presented that is simultaneously concise - given its small number of variables, in contrast to the large number of variables mentioned on the literature about this theme - and efficient - since it permits the creation of a Sovereign Risk Index that is compatible both with ratings of the major international agencies and with sovereign bond yields. In order to compare the countries ranking based on the Index to the rankings derived from ratings and bond yields, Spearman`s Ranking Correlation Coefficient is used. / [es] EL presente estudio tiene como objetivo construir un modelo que permita la categorización de los factores que generan el concepto de Riesgo Soberano y que defina las variables que lo componen. Para eso, se utilizan conocidos métodos estadísticos como Análisis Factorial y Análisis de Componentes Principales. Como resultado del trabajo se presenta un modelo que es simultáneamente conciso - por el pequeño número de variables que lo componen, en contraposición con el elevado número que es citado en la literatura sobre el tema - y eficiente - una vez que permite montar un Índice de Riesgo Soberano compatíble con los ratings de las principales agencias internacionales y con los retornos de títulos soberanos. Se utilizó el Coeficiente de Correlación de Spearman para comparar el orden de países por el índice propuesto y el orden derivado de los ratings y de los retornos de los títulos.

The ideas expressed in this thesis are meant to address the need for a transformation in the identity management systems currently in use in different parts of the world. Specifically, the paper presents a logical deduction of essential processes to allow for communication between individual people, governments, organizations, and private institutions to exchange and manage information pertaining to identity. This thesis proposes a conceptual framework for the design of an ecosystem that supports self-sovereign identity. The research reviews theory, methodology, and technology from subjects such as design, identity, and distributed systems. Through the design process, a set of elements and functions supporting interactions within an ecosystem were developed. The design is revolved around the ideas of privacy, security, distribution, and interoperability. The findings are presented as two parts of a whole, the first being the conceptual framework that describes a set of essential factors that an ecosystem requires in order to fulfill the goals of self-sovereign identity and interoperability. The second is a set of visualizations of how the framework can be used to design systems and interactions, inside and between the systems, to create an ecosystem. / <p>2022-06-20: Author's name has been corrected on the front page.</p>

La presente investigación tiene como objetivo examinar el efecto de las reservas internacionales en el spread soberano del Perú. Como factores adicionales que influyen en nuestra variable dependiente se han estudiado las exportaciones, saldo de cuenta corriente, términos de intercambio, IPC, tipo de cambio real, tipo de cambio nominal y bonos del tesoro de Estados Unidos. Esta investigación se realiza mediante un Modelo Vectorial de Corrección de Errores y el periodo de análisis comprende desde el 2000 al 2019. Los resultados obtenidos indican que las reservas internacionales han sido efectivas para disminuir el spread soberano en el periodo de análisis, es decir que, existe una relación inversa de largo plazo entre ambas variables, lo cual va en línea con la literatura existente. Además, se encuentra que tanto el saldo de cuenta corriente, las exportaciones, los términos de intercambio, el tipo de cambio real y los bonos del Tesoro de Estados Unidos, tienen relación de largo plazo con el spread soberano y tienen un efecto significativo y negativo sobre este. Por otro lado, la inflación tiene una relación positiva de corto y largo plazo con el EMBI. El tipo de cambio nominal no tiene significancia en el modelo. Por otro lado, los Bonos del Tesoro de Estados Unidos tienen una relación de corto plazo debido al efecto sustitución. / The main objective of this investigation is to examine the effect of international reserves on the sovereign spread of Peru. As additional factors influencing in our dependent variable, exports, current account balance, terms of trade, CPI inflation, real exchange rate, nominal exchange rate and United States Treasury bonds have been studied. This research is carried out using a Vectorial Error Correction Model and the analysis period is from 2000 to 2019. The results indicated that international reserves have been effective in reducing sovereign spread in the analysis period, it means, that there is a long-term inverse relationship between both variables, which is in line with the existing literature. Furthermore, it is found that both the current account balance, exports, terms of trade, the real exchange rate and United States Treasury bonds, have a long-term relationship with the sovereign spread and have a significant and negative effect. On the other hand, CPI inflation has a positive short and long-term relationship with EMBI. The nominal exchange rate has no significance in the model. In other hand, the United States Treasury Bonds have a positive short-term relationship with sovereign spread due to the replacement effect. / Trabajo de investigación