ABSTRACT
The special drawing right (SDR) is issued by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The SDR has the potential to strengthen dramatically the international monetary system. Established in 1969 and allocated twice during its first decade, the SDR was in the institutional closet from 1980 until 2009 when $250 billion in SDRs were allocated to members of the IMF to help address the global financial crisis. In 2021, another $650 billion in SDRs were allocated to help address the Coronavirus pandemic. The SDR has proved itself as a crisis instrument. This paper proposes regular annual SDR allocations.
ABSTRACT
The paper assesses whether Special Drawing Rights (SDR), namely international reserve assets and claims on freely useable currencies of its members created and allocated by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), are inflationary. This question has been already raised in the economic literature, but the paper does so by specifically analyzing its most recent and highest allocation in August 2021 on the one hand and its use by member countries to combat the COVID-19 crisis on the other. Moreover, the article revamps the logical-conceptual debate on the essence of money as issued by banks and what the IMF (which is not a bank) is monetarily speaking capable of.