Federal Reserve Bank
of San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank
of San Francisco

Economic Letter

Brief summaries of SF Fed economic research that explain in reader-friendly terms what our work means for the people we serve.

  • Will Inflation Targeting Work in Developing Countries?

    2001-01

    Kenneth Kasa

    Economists are often accused of not agreeing with each other. Believe it or not, the 1990s may have produced an exception.

  • East Asia: Recovery and Restructuring

    2000-38

    Ramon Moreno

    More than three years have passed since the collapse of the Thai baht triggered a wave of currency and financial crises in East Asia. After experiencing sharp economic contraction in 1998, East Asian economies have rebounded strongly, buttressed by rapid growth in their exports to the United States.

  • Should We Worry about the Large U.S. Current Account Deficit?

    2000-37

    Paul Bergin

    Over the last year the U.S. current account deficit has reached unprecedented levels. Figure 1 illustrates this by charting the falling trajectory of the current account balance, which essentially measures net exports of goods and services plus net income received from foreign investments.

  • California IPO Wealth Effects: What’s Left?

    2000-36

    Fred Furlong and Joe Mattey

    The year 2000 has been sobering for investors in firms that have had initial public offerings, or IPOs, in recent years. Those investors include, of course, employees holding stocks and stock options in these firms.

  • Patterns in the Foreign Ownership of U.S. Banking Assets

    2000-35

    Jose A. Lopez

    During the 1990s, the global economy experienced a major increase in trade and cross-border business activity, which created a greater demand for international financial services. Consequently, many commercial banks increased their cross-border activities, both to service their domestic customers and to gain new foreign customers.

  • Information Technology and Productivity

    2000-34

    Casey Cornwell and Bharat Trehan

    Productivity growth in the U.S. has picked up noticeably in recent years. From 1996 to 1999, average labor productivity, or ALP, in the private, nonfarm U.S. economy grew at a 2.8% annual rate, more than twice the rate that prevailed between 1980 and 1995.

  • The Shipping News: Western Exports Rebound

    2000-33

    Mary C. Daly

    After more than two years of weakness, exports from the West have begun to rebound. The recent pickup is due in large part to the economic resurgence of a number of trading partners of western states and to rapid growth in world demand for a variety of high-tech manufactured products.

  • Has Bank Performance Peaked?

    2000-32

    Simon Kwan

    After several years of rising to ever greater heights, bank profits took a dive in the second quarter, with return on assets (ROA) falling to 1.0%, the lowest it has been since 1992 (see Table “Banks Headquartered by Region”). The reason: poor performance at large banks, which had an ROA of 0.94%.

  • Monetary Policy in a New Environment: The U.S. Experience

    2000-31

    Robert T. Parry

    This Economic Letter is adapted from a presentation by Robert T. Parry, President and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, to the conference “Recent Developments in Financial Systems and Their Challenges for Economic Policy” sponsored by the Bank for International Settlements and The Deutsche Bundesbank September 29, 2000, in Frankfurt, Germany.

  • Knightian Uncertainty and Home Bias

    2000-30

    Kenneth Kasa

    More Americans than ever buy foreign goods, own foreign stocks, and work for foreign corporations. The U.S. economy is undoubtedly becoming more “globalized.”