Can East Asia Emulate European Economic Integration?
I. Overview
After a financial crisis broke out in Thailand in July, 1997 and started speeding
to other East Asian countries, Japan proposed creation of an Asian monetary fund (AMF)
as a framework for promoting financial cooperation and policy coordination in the region.
A regional monetary fund, it was argued, would provide a means of defence, in addition
to the IMF lending facilities, against future financial crises in East Asia. Although the
proposal received a positive response from a number of East Asian countries, it was
shelved at the objection of the U.S., EU, and the IMF. The AMF idea was revived again
when the finance ministers of ASEAN states plus China, Japan, and South Korea
(ASEAN+3) agreed on May 6 2000 in Chiang Mai, Thailand to establish a system of
swap arrangements within the ASEAN+3 countries in what is known as the Chiang Mai
Initiative (CMI).
Since then deputy financial ministers of the ASEAN+3 have negotiated the
details of the initiative to produce a basic framework of the ASEAN Swap Arrangement
(ASA) and Bilateral Swap Arrangements (BSAs) and Repo agreement among the thirteen
countries. The framework was approved at the meeting of the deputies on November 7,
2000 in Beijing. A progress report on the CMI was then reported to the summit meeting
of the thirteen countries two weeks later.
The CMI swap arrangements are designed to provide liquidity support for the
member countries that experience short-run balance of payment deficits in order to
prevent an extreme crisis or systemic failure in a country and subsequent regional
contagion as occurred in the recent East Asian financial crisis.
Emergency support facilities such as the CMI, similar in nature to other regional
and international “lender of last resort” facilities, are primarily for systemic purposes and
as such would likely be used very infrequently. Since the intent of the CMI is to be
proactive, there is a need to define a mutually agreed framework for inter country
cooperation amongst the ASEAN and ASEAN+3, that can quickly and effectively
implement emergency assistance at required levels when a need arises. Moreover, a
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group approach would ensure that any conditionality associated with the financial
assistance would be consistent across countries.
II. The Chiang Mai Initiative (CMI)
The CMI has two components:
(i) an expanded ASEAN swap arrangement; and
(ii) a network of bilateral swap and repurchase arrangements among the thirteen
countries.
In 1977, five ASEAN countries -- Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore,
and Thailand -- agreed to establish an ASEAN swap arrangement (ASA) – a short-term
liquidity support facility for the participating countries suffering balance of payment
difficulties. In May, 2000, the ASA was expanded to include the five new member
countries under the CMI and the total amount of the facility was raised to US$ 1 billion
from the initial amount of US$ 200 million.
The currencies available under the ASA are the U.S. dollar, yen, and euro. The
euro, yen and Euro LIBOR interest rates are used as the base rate for swap transactions.
Each member is allowed to draw from the facility a maximum of twice its committed
amount for a period not exceeding six months, subject to an extension for another period
not exceeding six months.
The BSA is a facility for short-term liquidity assistance in the form of swaps of
U.S. dollars with the domestic currencies of participating countries. The maximum
amount of drawing under each of the BSAs is to be determined by bilateral negotiations.
However, it is expected that disbursements to a member in need of liquidity assistance
will be made in a concerted manner through consultation among the swap providing
countries. One of these swap-providing countries will then serve as the coordinator for
the consulting process. The BSA agreement allows an automatic disbursement up to 10
percent of the maximum amount of drawing. However, countries drawing from the
facility more than the 10 percent are required to accept an IMF program for
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macroeconomic and structural adjustments. In this sense, the BSA is complementary to
the IMF’s financial assistance.
A number of the participating countries have expressed their reservation on the
linkage of the BSA with the IMF conditionality and have proposed to increase gradually
the 10 percent automatic draw down and also abolish the IMF linkage after a period of
transition. For instance, Malaysia advocates complete independence of the CMI from
the IMF. Severance of the IMF linkage requires creation of a regional surveillance
mechanism for the CMI. At the fifth ASEAN finance ministers’ meeting in April 2001 in
Kuala Lumpur, however, there was consensus that the BSA should remain
complementary and supplementary to IMF facilities until a regional surveillance system
is brought into existence. The ASEAN ministers also agreed that “the terms and
modalities of the BSA should take into account the different economic fundamentals,
specific circumstances, and financing needs of individual countries”. This agreement
implies that the contracting parties of the BSA could deviate from the basic framework
on setting terms and conditions of the swap agreements.
Participating countries are able to draw from the BSA for a period of 90 days.
The first drawing may be renewed seven times. The interest rate applicable to the
drawing is the LIBOR plus a premium of 150 basis points for the first and first renewal
drawings. Thereafter, the premium is increased by an additional 50 basis point for every
two renewal, but not exceeding 300 basis points.
The Repo agreement is also established to provide short-term liquidity to a
participating member through the sale and buyback of appropriate securities. Basic
features of Repo agreements are to be finalized through bilateral negotiations between
the contracting parties. Securities of the Repo agreement are U.S. Treasury notes or bills
with the remaining life of not more than 5 years and government securities of the
counterparty country of the Repo.
The period of the Repo agreement is one week, but could be extended on the
termination value date by agreement between the contracting parties. The minimum
amount for each repo transaction requested is five percent of the total amount of the
Repo agreement. In each Repo transaction, the buyer will be given a margin of 102
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percent for U.S. Treasury notes or bills and 105 percent for government securities of the
counterparty country.
III. Negotiations for the BSAs and Surveillance System
III-1 Progress
Since the ASEAN+3 summit meeting in November, 2000, Japan, China, and
Korea have been negotiating BSAs with each other and with the ASEAN. Japan has
been most active: it has concluded its negotiations with both Thailand and Philippines to
establish a BSA amounting to US$3 billion respectively. Japan and Malaysia have
agreed to add US$1 billion more to the initial amount of US$2.5 billion of the existing
BSA between the two countries. With Korea, Japan has contracted a bilateral swap of
US$2 billion. Korea has been negotiating with both China and Thailand for similar
arrangements. China and Thailand are expected to conclude a BSA on the order of
US$4 billion.
Among the ASEAN states, Singapore and Brunei have shown little enthusiasm
from the beginning for the CMI, largely because they believe the BSAs with their
neighboring countries will be one-way arrangements in which they will be asked to
provide a large amount of liquidity in case of a crisis affecting the ASEAN region.
However, Japan has made progress in bringing Singapore into the system by proposing a
BSA that uses local currencies rather than the U.S. dollar. In fact, Japan has proposed a
similar local-currency BSA with China which is equivalent to US$3 billion.
Indonesia has not shown any strong interest in negotiating BSA arrangements
with other participating countries, because of its preoccupation with domestic economic
issues and managing its huge foreign debts, not to mention of escalating political
instability. Recently, Indonesian has indicated its intention to negotiate a BSA with
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Japan, though it does not appear to place a high priority on contracting additional BSAs
with other members of the CMI.
At present, the total amount of BSAs covering all 13 countries is estimated to be
around US$20 billion. The maximum amount of money any individual country can
draw varies a great deal. In the case of Thailand, the maximum is about US$ 6 to 7
billion, 10 percent of which can be drawn automatically (US$ six hundred to seven
hundred million).
Given such a relatively small amount of liquidity available through the CMI,
doubts have been raised as to whether the BSA system could serve as a credible and
effective system of defence against speculative attacks in the future. Participants of
international financial markets are not likely to be impressed with the amount of liquidity
available and hence ignore the CMI, unless the ASEAN+3 are prepared to increase the
number of BSAs and expand the swap amount of each BSA.
III-2 Monitoring and Surveillance
From the inception of the CMI, some of the member countries have opposed the
idea of linking the CMI with the IMF program. Other members, in particular Japan and
China, have argued for the importance of forging a cooperative relation with the IMF at
an early stage of the CMI development to make it more credible. They have succeeded
in persuading Malaysia and other opposing members to accept the linkage of the BSAs
with the IMF conditionality as a temporary arrangement until a formal surveillance
mechanism is put in place. Malaysia agreed to the IMF linkage with the condition of
establishing a study group to examine the types of the monitoring and surveillance
system the CMI would require to function as an independent regional financial
arrangement.
Most participating countries agree in principle that the