In summary, the Asian economies clearly exhibited several growing weaknesses in the
mid-1990s, including rapidly-expanding and under-supervised financial systems, large short-term
capital inflows financing increasingly weak investments, and a sharp slowdown in the growth of
export revenues. The key issue is whether these problems add up to a crisis of the magnitude that
was seen in late 1997 and 1998. Banking systems in Asia had clearly been opened up too quickly,
but by most objective measures, the banks were not substantially weaker than those in many other
emerging markets. Investment quality was weakening, suggesting the prospect of a significant
downturn in several sectors, but not an complete economic collapse. These problems clearly
contributed to the reversal in creditor perceptions and to the onset of the crisis. However, on
balance, it is difficult to make the case that these problems were so severe as to warrant complete
collapse of the currencies in the region, a total breakdown of banking systems, and deep
recessions. Asia=s weaknesses required modest adjustments, but were not severe enough to
inevitably lead to a full-blown financial crisis. Thus, there is more to the story.