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On the sovereign debt paradox

Author

Listed:
  • V. Filipe Martins-da-Rocha

    (FGV
    CNRS, Unversité Paris-Dauphine, PSL Research University)

  • Yiannis Vailakis

    (University of Glasgow)

Abstract

Bulow and Rogoff (Am Econ Rev 79(1):43–50, 1989) show that lending to small countries cannot be supported merely on the country’s “reputation for repayment” if exclusion from future credit markets is the only consequence of default. Their arguments are valid under fairly general conditions, but they do not go through when the output of the sovereign may vanish along a path of successive low productivity shocks, or when it may grow unboundedly along a path of successive high productivity shocks. We propose an alternative proof illustrating that their renowned sovereign debt paradox holds in full generality.

Suggested Citation

  • V. Filipe Martins-da-Rocha & Yiannis Vailakis, 2017. "On the sovereign debt paradox," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 64(4), pages 825-846, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:joecth:v:64:y:2017:i:4:d:10.1007_s00199-016-0971-6
    DOI: 10.1007/s00199-016-0971-6
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    Cited by:

    1. Nicolas Houy & Frédéric Jouneau & François Le Grand, 2020. "Defaulting firms and systemic risks in financial networks: a normative approach," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 70(2), pages 503-526, September.
    2. Bloise, Gaetano & Polemarchakis, Herakles & Vailakis, Yiannis, 2017. "Sovereign debt and incentives to default with uninsurable risks," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 12(3), September.
    3. Victor Filipe Martins da Rocha & Toan Phan & Yiannis Vailakis, 2019. "Debt Limits and Credit Bubbles in General Equilibrium," Post-Print hal-02429759, HAL.
    4. Cristina Arellano & Timothy J. Kehoe & Herakles Polemarchakis, 2017. "Introduction to the Special Issue on Models of Debt and Debt Crises," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 64(4), pages 605-610, December.
    5. Łukasz Balbus, 2020. "On recursive utilities with non-affine aggregator and conditional certainty equivalent," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 70(2), pages 551-577, September.
    6. Victor Filipe Martins da Rocha & Yiannis Vailakis, 2014. "Self-enforcing Debt, Reputation, and the Role of Interest Rates," Working Papers hal-01097114, HAL.
    7. Filipe Martins da Rocha & Yiannis Vailakis, 2017. "Borrowing in Excess of Natural Ability to Repay," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 23, pages 42-59, January.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Sovereign risk; Lack of commitment; Reputation debt;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F34 - International Economics - - International Finance - - - International Lending and Debt Problems
    • H63 - Public Economics - - National Budget, Deficit, and Debt - - - Debt; Debt Management; Sovereign Debt

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