The household staff of Downton Abbey carry out their duties with effortless dignity, finesse and pride. Yet how do they know how exactly to lay the table, when to leave the room to give Lord and Lady Grantham their privacy, how to care for Lady Mary's furs and which uniform to wear when? This recently recovered and fascinating staff handbook answers all of these questions and more.Covering all the main positions of the Downton household - footman, lady's maid, housekeeper, groundsm...

This book brings together the experience of central banks and national statistical agencies in countries that focus their monetary policy on inflation targets. Inflation targeting has led to a close interface between these two sets of institutions. When the performance of a central bank is measured in terms of specified price indices, which are usually compiled and disseminated by the national statistical agency, the role of national statistical agencies becomes central to the credibility of ...

This book presents comprehensive coverage of project finance in Europe and North America. The Second Edition features two new case studies, all new pedagogical supplements including end-of-chapter questions and answers, and insights into the recent market downturn. The author provides a complete description of the ways a project finance deal can be organized-from industrial, legal, and financial standpoints-and the alternatives available for funding it. After reviewing recent advances in p...

The Bank Credit Analysis HandbookPraise for The Bank Credit Analysis Handbook“In this second edition, Philippe Delhaise and Jonathan Golin build on their professional experience with Thomson Bank Watch Asia to produce a clear introduction to bank credit risk analysis. As very few books on this topic exist, it is a most welcome publication. The short and transparent chapters are rich on institutional information, building on intuition. It is...

Microfinance is not simply banking; it is a development tool. It has been estimated that there are 500 million economically active poor people in the world operating microenterprises and small businesses. Most of them do not have access to adequate financial services. The purpose of this Handbook is to bring together in a single source guiding principles and tools that will promote sustainable microfinance and create viable institutions. The Handbook takes a global perspective, drawing on les...

The deflation of the subprime mortgage bubble in 2006-7 is widely agreed to have been the immediate cause of the collapse of the financial sector in 2008. Consequently, one might think that uncovering the origins of subprime lending would make the root causes of the crisis obvious. That is essentially where public debate about the causes of the crisis began—and ended—in the month following the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers and the 502-point fall in the Dow Jones Industrial Average in mid-S...

FINANCIAL ENGINEERINGFinancial engineering is poised for a great shift in the years ahead. Everyone from investors and borrowers to regulators and legislators will need to determine what works, what doesn't, and where to go from here. Financial Engineering-part of the Robert W. Kolb Series in Finance-has been designed to help you do just this. Comprised of contributed chapters by distinguished experts from industry and academia, this reliable resource will...

This accompanying document to the Guidelines for Public Debt Management, which the IMF and the World Bank co-published in 2001, contains sample case studies that illustrate how a range of countries from around the world and at different stages of economic and financial development are developing their debt management capacity in a manner consistent with the guidelines. The experience of these countries is discussed in this publication, and should offer some useful and practical suggestions...

Mutual funds form the bedrock of retirement savings in the United States, and, considering their rapid growth, are sure to be more critical in the future. Because the size of fees paid by investors to mutual fund advisers can strongly affect the return on investment, these fees have become a contentious issue in Congress and the courts, with many arguing that investment advisers grow rich at the expense of investors.This ground-breaking book not only conceptualizes a new economic m...

The Oxford Handbook of Banking provides an overview and analysis of state-of-the-art research in banking written by leading researchers in the field. This handbook will appeal to graduate students of economics, banking and finance, academics, practitioners and policy makers. Consequently, the book strikes a balance between abstract theory, empirical analysis, and practitioner and policy-related material. The handbook is split into five parts. Part I, The Theory of Banking, examine...

Japan’s weak economic performance in the 1990s has had implications not only for its own people, but for the world economy more generally, given Japan’s importance as a trading partner and supplier of capital. Therefore, it is essential that Japan unlock its growth potential. The IMF has worked with the Japanese authorities to identify the policies needed to bring Japan’s economy out of its recent slump. This book contributes to this ongoing debate, whose major topics include the need for an ...