Th e European and Asian fi nancial crises are the two most recent major regional crises. Th is paper compares their origins
and evolution. Th e origins of the two sets of crises were diff erent in some respects, but broadly similar. Th e two sets
of crises also shared similarities in their evolution, but here the diff erences were more signifi cant. Th e European crisis
countries received more external fi nancial support, despite the fact that they involved more solvency issues while the
Asian crises involved more liquidity issues. On balance, the reform programs in the European crises were less demanding
and rigorous than in the Asian crises. Partly as a consequence, the negative impacts on the global economy have been
larger. I draw three lessons from this analysis: First, history will repeat itself; there will be other external fi nancial crises.
Second, other countries have a stake in appropriate crisis management. Th ird, the IMF and other countries were
mistaken in treating the European crises as individual country crises rather than as a crisis for the euro area as a whole
that demanded policy conditionality on all members of the euro area.