Knowledge

Reading Room

The intellectual foundations of Institutional Macro Intelligence

A curated library of books, academic research and institutional publications for understanding money, credit, financial markets, global capital flows and the macro-financial system.

Where to Start

Macroeconomic intelligence is built on accumulated knowledge. Start with the Core Canon, then explore the major analytical building blocks of the global macro-financial system.

01
Money & Credit
How money is created, priced and transmitted through the economy and financial system.
Library shelf Reading path Knowledge: Lesson 1 Knowledge: Lesson 2
02
Banking & Financial Cycles
Balance sheets, leverage, liquidity, financial intermediation and instability.
Library shelf Reading path Knowledge: Part I
03
Monetary & Fiscal Policy
Central banks, interest rates, inflation, public debt and policy regimes.
Library shelf Reading path Knowledge: Part II Knowledge: Part X
04
Global Capital & External Balances
Saving, investment, trade, current accounts, capital flows and external balance sheets.
Library shelf Reading path Knowledge: Part VI Knowledge: Part VII
05
The Dollar & Global Monetary System
Reserve currencies, dollar funding, global liquidity and the international monetary system.
Library shelf Reading path Knowledge: Part III Knowledge: Part XII
06
Financial Crises & Regime Change
Financial instability, crises, policy responses and transitions between macro-financial regimes.
Library shelf Reading path Knowledge: Part XIII

The Core Canon

10 foundational works for understanding the global macro-financial system

01
Charles P. Kindleberger
Manias, Panics, and Crashes
Book · 1978 · Foundational
- Financial Crises
- Liquidity
- Speculation
A foundational historical framework for understanding how credit expansion, speculation, liquidity and financial instability interact.
Why it matters. It gives the reader a recurring sequence (displacement, credit-fuelled boom, euphoria, distress, panic) against which any new episode of financial stress can be compared.
02
Hyman P. Minsky
Stabilizing an Unstable Economy
Book · 1986 · Advanced
- Financial Instability
- Leverage
- Balance Sheets
A central framework for understanding how financial stability can generate the conditions for future instability through leverage and changing financing structures.
Why it matters. It shifts attention from shocks to balance-sheet structure: how cash-flow commitments, not only prices, determine fragility.
03
Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff
This Time Is Different
Book · 2009 · Intermediate
- Financial Crises
- Sovereign Debt
- Historical Macro
A major historical study of financial crises, sovereign debt, banking crises, defaults and recurring patterns of financial stress.
Why it matters. Its long-run dataset anchors discussion of debt and crises in eight centuries of evidence rather than in recent experience alone.
04
Barry Eichengreen
Globalizing Capital: A History of the International Monetary System
Book · 1996 · Foundational
- International Monetary System
- Capital Mobility
- Monetary Regimes
A historical account of the evolution of international monetary arrangements, capital mobility and the global financial system.
Why it matters. It shows that today’s dollar-centred arrangements are one regime among several, which is the precondition for asking what could replace them.
05
Michael Pettis
The Great Rebalancing: Trade, Conflict, and the Perilous Road Ahead for the World Economy
Book · 2013 · Foundational
- Global Imbalances
- Trade
- Saving
- Capital Flows
An accessible framework for understanding the relationship between domestic saving, investment, trade balances and global capital flows.
Why it matters. It treats the current account as the mirror of domestic saving and investment decisions, which is the logic behind how external balances are read in this publication.
06
Ben S. Bernanke
21st Century Monetary Policy: The Federal Reserve from the Great Inflation to COVID-19
Book · 2022 · Intermediate
- Central Banking
- QE
- Monetary Policy
An institutional history of the transformation of modern central banking, including quantitative easing and other unconventional policy tools.
Why it matters. It is a first-hand account of how the policy toolkit, and the balance-sheet role of the central bank, changed between the 1970s and the pandemic.
07
Maurice Obstfeld & Kenneth Rogoff
Foundations of International Macroeconomics
Book · 1996 · Advanced
- International Economics
- Exchange Rates
- Capital Flows
A major theoretical foundation for understanding open-economy macroeconomics, exchange rates, international capital movements and policy interactions.
Why it matters. It supplies the intertemporal, balance-sheet logic of the current account that most applied discussion of external imbalances implicitly relies on.
08
Perry Mehrling
The New Lombard Street: How the Fed Became the Dealer of Last Resort
Book · 2011 · Intermediate
- Financial Markets
- Liquidity
- Dealers
- Central Banking
A framework for understanding modern finance through liquidity, market-making, dealer balance sheets and central-bank intervention.
Why it matters. It reads the financial system as a hierarchy of promises to pay, with the central bank at the top, which complements the hierarchy of money in Lesson 2.
09
Barry Eichengreen
Exorbitant Privilege: The Rise and Fall of the Dollar and the Future of the International Monetary System
Book · 2011 · Foundational
- Dollar System
- Reserve Currency
- Global Monetary System
An analysis of the international role of the US dollar and the economic and institutional foundations of dollar dominance.
Why it matters. It separates the sources of dollar dominance (network effects, market depth, institutions) from its contingent features, which frames the de-dollarisation debate.
10
Bank for International Settlements
Annual Economic Report
Institutional Publication · Annual · Intermediate
- Global Macro-Financial System
- Monetary Policy
- Financial Stability
The BIS’s major annual assessment of the global economy, monetary policy, financial conditions and structural macro-financial risks.
Why it matters. It is the most consistent institutional reading of how monetary, fiscal and financial-stability issues interact, published every year by the central banks’ bank.
Official source ↗

The Annual Economic Report of the BIS is deliberately part of the canon: the Reading Room is not restricted to books, and institutional research is part of the intellectual canon.

From Money to the Global Financial System

The Reading Room is not merely a list of books. It is an intellectual map of the system studied by Institutional Macro Intelligence. Each concept links to the matching part of the Knowledge publication.

Thematic Library

Explore the literature through the major analytical building blocks of the global macro-financial system.

Money & Monetary Economics

What money is, how it is created and how monetary policy works.

Ben S. Bernanke
21st Century Monetary Policy: The Federal Reserve from the Great Inflation to COVID-19
Book · 2022 · Intermediate
An institutional history of the transformation of modern central banking, including quantitative easing and other unconventional policy tools.
John Maynard Keynes
The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money
Book · 1936 · Advanced
The founding text of modern macroeconomics, linking money, interest rates, expectations and effective demand.
Charles A. E. Goodhart
Money, Information and Uncertainty
Book · 1989 · Advanced
A systematic treatment of the institutional and informational foundations of money, banking and central banking.
Michael McLeay, Amar Radia & Ryland Thomas (Bank of England)
Money creation in the modern economy
Institutional Publication · 2014 · Foundational
A concise central-bank explanation of how commercial-bank lending creates deposits and how this relates to reserves and monetary policy.
Official source ↗
Perry Mehrling
The Money View
Research Collection · Intermediate
Mehrling’s framework for analysing finance as a system of balance sheets and promises to pay, developed across his writing and lectures.

Banking & Financial Architecture

Balance sheets, liquidity, dealers, shadow banking and the structure of the financial system.

Hyman P. Minsky
Stabilizing an Unstable Economy
Book · 1986 · Advanced
A central framework for understanding how financial stability can generate the conditions for future instability through leverage and changing financing structures.
Perry Mehrling
The New Lombard Street: How the Fed Became the Dealer of Last Resort
Book · 2011 · Intermediate
A framework for understanding modern finance through liquidity, market-making, dealer balance sheets and central-bank intervention.
Perry Mehrling
The Money View
Research Collection · Intermediate
Mehrling’s framework for analysing finance as a system of balance sheets and promises to pay, developed across his writing and lectures.
Ulrich Bindseil & Alessio Fotia
Introduction to Central Banking
Book · 2021 · Intermediate
A rigorous introduction to central-bank balance sheets, operational frameworks and the mechanics of monetary policy implementation.
Zoltan Pozsar and co-authors
Shadow banking and money-view research (including “Shadow Banking”, Federal Reserve Bank of New York Staff Report 458)
Research Collection · 2010 onwards · Advanced
Research mapping non-bank credit intermediation and institutional cash pools within a money-view framework.

Financial Cycles & Crises

Booms, busts and the historical record of financial instability.

Charles P. Kindleberger
Manias, Panics, and Crashes
Book · 1978 · Foundational
A foundational historical framework for understanding how credit expansion, speculation, liquidity and financial instability interact.
Hyman P. Minsky
Stabilizing an Unstable Economy
Book · 1986 · Advanced
A central framework for understanding how financial stability can generate the conditions for future instability through leverage and changing financing structures.
Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff
This Time Is Different
Book · 2009 · Intermediate
A major historical study of financial crises, sovereign debt, banking crises, defaults and recurring patterns of financial stress.
Robert J. Shiller
Irrational Exuberance
Book · 2000 · Foundational
An examination of speculative booms in equity and housing markets and of the narratives and psychology that sustain them.
Adam Tooze
Crashed: How a Decade of Financial Crises Changed the World
Book · 2018 · Intermediate
A global account of the 2008 crisis and its aftermath that places transatlantic bank balance sheets and dollar funding at the centre.
Andrew Ross Sorkin
Too Big to Fail
Book · 2009 · Foundational
A narrative reconstruction of the decisions taken by banks and policymakers during the autumn 2008 crisis.

Global Imbalances & Capital Flows

Saving, investment, external balances and international capital movements.

Michael Pettis
The Great Rebalancing: Trade, Conflict, and the Perilous Road Ahead for the World Economy
Book · 2013 · Foundational
An accessible framework for understanding the relationship between domestic saving, investment, trade balances and global capital flows.
Maurice Obstfeld & Kenneth Rogoff
Foundations of International Macroeconomics
Book · 1996 · Advanced
A major theoretical foundation for understanding open-economy macroeconomics, exchange rates, international capital movements and policy interactions.
Maurice Obstfeld & Alan M. Taylor
Global Capital Markets: Integration, Crisis, and Growth
Book · 2004 · Advanced
A long-run history of international capital mobility and the trilemma of exchange rates, capital flows and monetary autonomy.
Gita Gopinath and co-authors
Dominant Currency Paradigm
Academic Paper · 2020 · Advanced
Evidence that trade is invoiced mainly in a few dominant currencies, mostly the dollar, with consequences for exchange-rate pass-through and trade adjustment.
Hélène Rey
Dilemma not Trilemma: The Global Financial Cycle and Monetary Policy Independence
Academic Paper · 2015 · Advanced
The argument that a global financial cycle constrains national monetary autonomy even under floating exchange rates.

Fiscal Policy & Sovereign Risk

Public debt, fiscal space and the link between sovereigns and banks.

Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff
This Time Is Different
Book · 2009 · Intermediate
A major historical study of financial crises, sovereign debt, banking crises, defaults and recurring patterns of financial stress.
Olivier Blanchard
Public Debt and Low Interest Rates
Academic Paper · 2019 · Intermediate
An analysis of how the gap between interest rates and growth shapes the fiscal cost of public debt.
International Monetary Fund
Fiscal Monitor
Institutional Publication · Biannual · Intermediate
The IMF’s biannual assessment of public finances, debt trajectories and fiscal risks across the world’s economies.
Official source ↗
Bank for International Settlements
BIS research on public debt, sovereign bond markets and financial stability
Research Collection · Advanced
BIS analysis of the interaction between public debt, sovereign bond markets and the financial system.
Official source ↗
BIS, ECB, IMF and academic authors
Sovereign–bank nexus literature
Research Collection · Advanced
Research on the two-way link between government creditworthiness and bank balance sheets.

Dollar & International Monetary System

Reserve currencies, dollar funding, global liquidity and the global financial cycle.

Barry Eichengreen
Globalizing Capital: A History of the International Monetary System
Book · 1996 · Foundational
A historical account of the evolution of international monetary arrangements, capital mobility and the global financial system.
Barry Eichengreen
Exorbitant Privilege: The Rise and Fall of the Dollar and the Future of the International Monetary System
Book · 2011 · Foundational
An analysis of the international role of the US dollar and the economic and institutional foundations of dollar dominance.
Gita Gopinath and co-authors
Dominant Currency Paradigm
Academic Paper · 2020 · Advanced
Evidence that trade is invoiced mainly in a few dominant currencies, mostly the dollar, with consequences for exchange-rate pass-through and trade adjustment.
Hélène Rey
Dilemma not Trilemma: The Global Financial Cycle and Monetary Policy Independence
Academic Paper · 2015 · Advanced
The argument that a global financial cycle constrains national monetary autonomy even under floating exchange rates.
Hyun Song Shin and BIS authors
BIS global liquidity and dollar funding research
Research Collection · Advanced
BIS research on cross-border bank and non-bank dollar credit, global liquidity indicators and their transmission.
Official source ↗

Institutional Macro Research

The flagship publications of the institutions that monitor the system (see Institutional Reading).

Bank for International Settlements
Annual Economic Report
Institutional Publication · Annual · Intermediate
The BIS’s major annual assessment of the global economy, monetary policy, financial conditions and structural macro-financial risks.
Official source ↗
International Monetary Fund
Fiscal Monitor
Institutional Publication · Biannual · Intermediate
The IMF’s biannual assessment of public finances, debt trajectories and fiscal risks across the world’s economies.
Official source ↗

Institutional Reading

The institutions that continuously monitor the global macro-financial system

Bank for International Settlements

The central banks’ bank; its work on global liquidity, credit and financial stability is the closest institutional counterpart to a balance-sheet reading of the system.

Annual Economic Report
Quarterly Review
Selected research

Knowledge Graph entity: BIS

International Monetary Fund

The reference for cross-country macroeconomic projections, external-sector assessment and surveillance of global financial and fiscal risks.

World Economic Outlook
Global Financial Stability Report
Fiscal Monitor

Knowledge Graph entity: IMF

European Central Bank

The monetary authority of the euro area and the source of its monetary statistics, financial-stability assessments and analysis of the euro’s international role.

Economic Bulletin
Financial Stability Review

Knowledge Graph entity: ECB

Federal Reserve

The issuer of the dominant reserve currency; its reports show how the US policy stance and financial-stability assessment shape global conditions.

Monetary Policy Report
Financial Stability Report

Knowledge Graph entity: FED

OECD

A comparable cross-country framework for growth, inflation and structural policy across advanced and major emerging economies.

Economic Outlook

Knowledge Graph entity: OECD

World Bank

The principal institutional view of emerging and developing economies, including debt, growth and external vulnerabilities.

Global Economic Prospects

Knowledge Graph entity: WORLD_BANK

Bank of England

A leading central-bank source on money, banking and financial-stability analysis, with a major international financial centre in its remit.

Monetary Policy Report
Financial Stability Report

Knowledge Graph entity: BOE

Current Reading

What deserves attention now

Federal Reserve · 10 July 2026
Monetary Policy Report, July 2026
Monetary policy · Inflation · Financial developments
The Board’s semiannual report to Congress on monetary policy, economic developments and financial conditions.
BIS · 28 June 2026
Annual Economic Report 2026
Financial stability · Fiscal–financial nexus · Inflation
Assesses how the global economy is faring as progress meets rising perils, including a new fiscal–financial stability nexus and shifting inflation dynamics.
World Bank · 11 June 2026
Global Economic Prospects, June 2026
Global growth · Energy prices · Emerging markets
Projects global growth of 2.5% in 2026 and assesses the effect of the Middle East conflict and higher energy prices, with a focus on emerging and developing economies.
OECD · 3 June 2026
Economic Outlook, Volume 2026 Issue 1: Under Pressure
Growth · Inflation · Policy responses
Short-term projections and policy recommendations for OECD and major partner economies, including a chapter on defence spending.
ECB · 27 May 2026
Financial Stability Review, May 2026
Financial stability · Energy · Non-bank finance
The ECB’s twice-yearly assessment of euro-area financial stability, in a setting of geoeconomic stress and energy-supply disruption.
Federal Reserve · 8 May 2026
Financial Stability Report, May 2026
Financial stability · Vulnerabilities
The Board’s semiannual assessment of the resilience of the US financial system.
IMF · 15 April 2026
Fiscal Monitor, April 2026
Fiscal policy · Public debt
Assesses public finances and debt trajectories; global public debt is estimated just under 94% of GDP in 2025 and projected to reach 100% by 2029.
IMF · 14 April 2026
Global Financial Stability Report, April 2026: Global Financial Markets Confront the War in the Middle East and Amplification Risks
Financial stability · Amplification risks
The IMF’s semiannual assessment of global financial-stability risks in light of the conflict in the Middle East.
IMF · 14 April 2026
World Economic Outlook, April 2026: Global Economy in the Shadow of War
Growth · Inflation · Energy
Projects global growth of 3.1% in 2026 and higher headline inflation, reflecting energy and food prices.

Titles, dates and links were checked against official institutional sources.

Reading Paths

Follow a structured sequence through a specific macro-financial problem rather than reading the library linearly.

Path 1

Understanding Money & Credit

1Michael McLeay, Amar Radia & Ryland Thomas: Money creation in the modern economy
2John Maynard Keynes: The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money
3Ben S. Bernanke: 21st Century Monetary Policy: The Federal Reserve from the Great Inflation to COVID-19
4Perry Mehrling: The Money View
5Hyman P. Minsky: Stabilizing an Unstable Economy

Start Path →

Path 2

Understanding Financial Crises

1Charles P. Kindleberger: Manias, Panics, and Crashes
2Hyman P. Minsky: Stabilizing an Unstable Economy
3Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff: This Time Is Different
4Robert J. Shiller: Irrational Exuberance
5Adam Tooze: Crashed: How a Decade of Financial Crises Changed the World

Start Path →

Path 3

Understanding the Global Monetary System

1Barry Eichengreen: Globalizing Capital: A History of the International Monetary System
2Barry Eichengreen: Exorbitant Privilege: The Rise and Fall of the Dollar and the Future of the International Monetary System
3Maurice Obstfeld & Kenneth Rogoff: Foundations of International Macroeconomics
4Hélène Rey: Dilemma not Trilemma: The Global Financial Cycle and Monetary Policy Independence
5Hyun Song Shin and BIS authors: BIS global liquidity and dollar funding research

Start Path →

Path 4

Understanding Global Imbalances

1Michael Pettis: The Great Rebalancing: Trade, Conflict, and the Perilous Road Ahead for the World Economy
2Maurice Obstfeld & Kenneth Rogoff: Foundations of International Macroeconomics
3Maurice Obstfeld & Alan M. Taylor: Global Capital Markets: Integration, Crisis, and Growth
4Gita Gopinath and co-authors: Dominant Currency Paradigm
5Bank for International Settlements: Annual Economic Report

Start Path →

Path 5

Understanding Sovereign Risk

1Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff: This Time Is Different
2Olivier Blanchard: Public Debt and Low Interest Rates
3International Monetary Fund: Fiscal Monitor
4Bank for International Settlements: BIS research on public debt, sovereign bond markets and financial stability
5BIS, ECB, IMF and academic authors: Sovereign–bank nexus literature

Start Path →

Reading Room Reviews

Reviews are analytical interpretations of a work, not summaries. Each follows the same structure and ends with the Institutional Macro Intelligence Perspective: what the work contributes to an institutional macro framework, and where it is incomplete, dated or contested.

1.The Work
2.The Central Argument
3.Key Concepts
4.Why It Matters
5.Institutional Macro Perspective
6.Critical Perspective
7.Relevance Today
8.Related Knowledge

The Reading Room is educational and analytical. Inclusion of a work does not imply endorsement of every argument it contains, and nothing here is a recommendation to buy or sell any security.

This content is for informational purposes only and is not investment, legal, or tax advice. See the full Disclaimer.

The Core Canon

10 foundational works for understanding the global macro-financial system

Charles P. Kindleberger

Manias, Panics, and Crashes

Book · 1978 · Foundational

Financial Crises
Liquidity
Speculation

A foundational historical framework for understanding how credit expansion, speculation, liquidity and financial instability interact.

Why it matters. It gives the reader a recurring sequence (displacement, credit-fuelled boom, euphoria, distress, panic) against which any new episode of financial stress can be compared.

Hyman P. Minsky

Stabilizing an Unstable Economy

Book · 1986 · Advanced

Financial Instability
Leverage
Balance Sheets

A central framework for understanding how financial stability can generate the conditions for future instability through leverage and changing financing structures.

Why it matters. It shifts attention from shocks to balance-sheet structure: how cash-flow commitments, not only prices, determine fragility.

Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff

This Time Is Different

Book · 2009 · Intermediate

Financial Crises
Sovereign Debt
Historical Macro

A major historical study of financial crises, sovereign debt, banking crises, defaults and recurring patterns of financial stress.

Why it matters. Its long-run dataset anchors discussion of debt and crises in eight centuries of evidence rather than in recent experience alone.

Barry Eichengreen

Globalizing Capital: A History of the International Monetary System

Book · 1996 · Foundational

International Monetary System
Capital Mobility
Monetary Regimes

A historical account of the evolution of international monetary arrangements, capital mobility and the global financial system.

Why it matters. It shows that today’s dollar-centred arrangements are one regime among several, which is the precondition for asking what could replace them.

Michael Pettis

The Great Rebalancing: Trade, Conflict, and the Perilous Road Ahead for the World Economy

Book · 2013 · Foundational

Global Imbalances
Trade
Saving
Capital Flows

An accessible framework for understanding the relationship between domestic saving, investment, trade balances and global capital flows.

Why it matters. It treats the current account as the mirror of domestic saving and investment decisions, which is the logic behind how external balances are read in this publication.

Ben S. Bernanke

21st Century Monetary Policy: The Federal Reserve from the Great Inflation to COVID-19

Book · 2022 · Intermediate

Central Banking
QE
Monetary Policy

An institutional history of the transformation of modern central banking, including quantitative easing and other unconventional policy tools.

Why it matters. It is a first-hand account of how the policy toolkit, and the balance-sheet role of the central bank, changed between the 1970s and the pandemic.

Maurice Obstfeld & Kenneth Rogoff

Foundations of International Macroeconomics

Book · 1996 · Advanced

International Economics
Exchange Rates
Capital Flows

A major theoretical foundation for understanding open-economy macroeconomics, exchange rates, international capital movements and policy interactions.

Why it matters. It supplies the intertemporal, balance-sheet logic of the current account that most applied discussion of external imbalances implicitly relies on.

Perry Mehrling

The New Lombard Street: How the Fed Became the Dealer of Last Resort

Book · 2011 · Intermediate

Financial Markets
Liquidity
Dealers
Central Banking

A framework for understanding modern finance through liquidity, market-making, dealer balance sheets and central-bank intervention.

Why it matters. It reads the financial system as a hierarchy of promises to pay, with the central bank at the top, which complements the hierarchy of money in Lesson 2.

Barry Eichengreen

Exorbitant Privilege: The Rise and Fall of the Dollar and the Future of the International Monetary System

Book · 2011 · Foundational

Dollar System
Reserve Currency
Global Monetary System

An analysis of the international role of the US dollar and the economic and institutional foundations of dollar dominance.

Why it matters. It separates the sources of dollar dominance (network effects, market depth, institutions) from its contingent features, which frames the de-dollarisation debate.

Bank for International Settlements

Annual Economic Report

Institutional Publication · Annual · Intermediate

Global Macro-Financial System
Monetary Policy
Financial Stability

The BIS’s major annual assessment of the global economy, monetary policy, financial conditions and structural macro-financial risks.

Why it matters. It is the most consistent institutional reading of how monetary, fiscal and financial-stability issues interact, published every year by the central banks’ bank.

Official source ↗

The Annual Economic Report of the BIS is deliberately part of the canon: the Reading Room is not restricted to books, and institutional research is part of the intellectual canon.

Thematic Library

Explore the literature through the major analytical building blocks of the global macro-financial system.

Money & Monetary Economics

What money is, how it is created and how monetary policy works.

Ben S. Bernanke
21st Century Monetary Policy: The Federal Reserve from the Great Inflation to COVID-19
Book · 2022 · Intermediate
An institutional history of the transformation of modern central banking, including quantitative easing and other unconventional policy tools.
John Maynard Keynes
The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money
Book · 1936 · Advanced
The founding text of modern macroeconomics, linking money, interest rates, expectations and effective demand.
Charles A. E. Goodhart
Money, Information and Uncertainty
Book · 1989 · Advanced
A systematic treatment of the institutional and informational foundations of money, banking and central banking.
Michael McLeay, Amar Radia & Ryland Thomas (Bank of England)
Money creation in the modern economy
Institutional Publication · 2014 · Foundational
A concise central-bank explanation of how commercial-bank lending creates deposits and how this relates to reserves and monetary policy.
Official source ↗
Perry Mehrling
The Money View
Research Collection · Intermediate
Mehrling’s framework for analysing finance as a system of balance sheets and promises to pay, developed across his writing and lectures.

Banking & Financial Architecture

Balance sheets, liquidity, dealers, shadow banking and the structure of the financial system.

Hyman P. Minsky
Stabilizing an Unstable Economy
Book · 1986 · Advanced
A central framework for understanding how financial stability can generate the conditions for future instability through leverage and changing financing structures.
Perry Mehrling
The New Lombard Street: How the Fed Became the Dealer of Last Resort
Book · 2011 · Intermediate
A framework for understanding modern finance through liquidity, market-making, dealer balance sheets and central-bank intervention.
Perry Mehrling
The Money View
Research Collection · Intermediate
Mehrling’s framework for analysing finance as a system of balance sheets and promises to pay, developed across his writing and lectures.
Ulrich Bindseil & Alessio Fotia
Introduction to Central Banking
Book · 2021 · Intermediate
A rigorous introduction to central-bank balance sheets, operational frameworks and the mechanics of monetary policy implementation.
Zoltan Pozsar and co-authors
Shadow banking and money-view research (including “Shadow Banking”, Federal Reserve Bank of New York Staff Report 458)
Research Collection · 2010 onwards · Advanced
Research mapping non-bank credit intermediation and institutional cash pools within a money-view framework.

Financial Cycles & Crises

Booms, busts and the historical record of financial instability.

Charles P. Kindleberger
Manias, Panics, and Crashes
Book · 1978 · Foundational
A foundational historical framework for understanding how credit expansion, speculation, liquidity and financial instability interact.
Hyman P. Minsky
Stabilizing an Unstable Economy
Book · 1986 · Advanced
A central framework for understanding how financial stability can generate the conditions for future instability through leverage and changing financing structures.
Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff
This Time Is Different
Book · 2009 · Intermediate
A major historical study of financial crises, sovereign debt, banking crises, defaults and recurring patterns of financial stress.
Robert J. Shiller
Irrational Exuberance
Book · 2000 · Foundational
An examination of speculative booms in equity and housing markets and of the narratives and psychology that sustain them.
Adam Tooze
Crashed: How a Decade of Financial Crises Changed the World
Book · 2018 · Intermediate
A global account of the 2008 crisis and its aftermath that places transatlantic bank balance sheets and dollar funding at the centre.
Andrew Ross Sorkin
Too Big to Fail
Book · 2009 · Foundational
A narrative reconstruction of the decisions taken by banks and policymakers during the autumn 2008 crisis.

Global Imbalances & Capital Flows

Saving, investment, external balances and international capital movements.

Michael Pettis
The Great Rebalancing: Trade, Conflict, and the Perilous Road Ahead for the World Economy
Book · 2013 · Foundational
An accessible framework for understanding the relationship between domestic saving, investment, trade balances and global capital flows.
Maurice Obstfeld & Kenneth Rogoff
Foundations of International Macroeconomics
Book · 1996 · Advanced
A major theoretical foundation for understanding open-economy macroeconomics, exchange rates, international capital movements and policy interactions.
Maurice Obstfeld & Alan M. Taylor
Global Capital Markets: Integration, Crisis, and Growth
Book · 2004 · Advanced
A long-run history of international capital mobility and the trilemma of exchange rates, capital flows and monetary autonomy.
Gita Gopinath and co-authors
Dominant Currency Paradigm
Academic Paper · 2020 · Advanced
Evidence that trade is invoiced mainly in a few dominant currencies, mostly the dollar, with consequences for exchange-rate pass-through and trade adjustment.
Hélène Rey
Dilemma not Trilemma: The Global Financial Cycle and Monetary Policy Independence
Academic Paper · 2015 · Advanced
The argument that a global financial cycle constrains national monetary autonomy even under floating exchange rates.

Fiscal Policy & Sovereign Risk

Public debt, fiscal space and the link between sovereigns and banks.

Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff
This Time Is Different
Book · 2009 · Intermediate
A major historical study of financial crises, sovereign debt, banking crises, defaults and recurring patterns of financial stress.
Olivier Blanchard
Public Debt and Low Interest Rates
Academic Paper · 2019 · Intermediate
An analysis of how the gap between interest rates and growth shapes the fiscal cost of public debt.
International Monetary Fund
Fiscal Monitor
Institutional Publication · Biannual · Intermediate
The IMF’s biannual assessment of public finances, debt trajectories and fiscal risks across the world’s economies.
Official source ↗
Bank for International Settlements
BIS research on public debt, sovereign bond markets and financial stability
Research Collection · Advanced
BIS analysis of the interaction between public debt, sovereign bond markets and the financial system.
Official source ↗
BIS, ECB, IMF and academic authors
Sovereign–bank nexus literature
Research Collection · Advanced
Research on the two-way link between government creditworthiness and bank balance sheets.

Dollar & International Monetary System

Reserve currencies, dollar funding, global liquidity and the global financial cycle.

Barry Eichengreen
Globalizing Capital: A History of the International Monetary System
Book · 1996 · Foundational
A historical account of the evolution of international monetary arrangements, capital mobility and the global financial system.
Barry Eichengreen
Exorbitant Privilege: The Rise and Fall of the Dollar and the Future of the International Monetary System
Book · 2011 · Foundational
An analysis of the international role of the US dollar and the economic and institutional foundations of dollar dominance.
Gita Gopinath and co-authors
Dominant Currency Paradigm
Academic Paper · 2020 · Advanced
Evidence that trade is invoiced mainly in a few dominant currencies, mostly the dollar, with consequences for exchange-rate pass-through and trade adjustment.
Hélène Rey
Dilemma not Trilemma: The Global Financial Cycle and Monetary Policy Independence
Academic Paper · 2015 · Advanced
The argument that a global financial cycle constrains national monetary autonomy even under floating exchange rates.
Hyun Song Shin and BIS authors
BIS global liquidity and dollar funding research
Research Collection · Advanced
BIS research on cross-border bank and non-bank dollar credit, global liquidity indicators and their transmission.
Official source ↗

Institutional Macro Research

The flagship publications of the institutions that monitor the system (see Institutional Reading).

Bank for International Settlements
Annual Economic Report
Institutional Publication · Annual · Intermediate
The BIS’s major annual assessment of the global economy, monetary policy, financial conditions and structural macro-financial risks.
Official source ↗
International Monetary Fund
Fiscal Monitor
Institutional Publication · Biannual · Intermediate
The IMF’s biannual assessment of public finances, debt trajectories and fiscal risks across the world’s economies.
Official source ↗

Institutional Reading

The institutions that continuously monitor the global macro-financial system

Bank for International Settlements

The central banks’ bank; its work on global liquidity, credit and financial stability is the closest institutional counterpart to a balance-sheet reading of the system.

Annual Economic Report
Quarterly Review
Selected research

Knowledge Graph entity: BIS

International Monetary Fund

The reference for cross-country macroeconomic projections, external-sector assessment and surveillance of global financial and fiscal risks.

World Economic Outlook
Global Financial Stability Report
Fiscal Monitor

Knowledge Graph entity: IMF

European Central Bank

The monetary authority of the euro area and the source of its monetary statistics, financial-stability assessments and analysis of the euro’s international role.

Economic Bulletin
Financial Stability Review

Knowledge Graph entity: ECB

Federal Reserve

The issuer of the dominant reserve currency; its reports show how the US policy stance and financial-stability assessment shape global conditions.

Monetary Policy Report
Financial Stability Report

Knowledge Graph entity: FED

OECD

A comparable cross-country framework for growth, inflation and structural policy across advanced and major emerging economies.

Economic Outlook

Knowledge Graph entity: OECD

World Bank

The principal institutional view of emerging and developing economies, including debt, growth and external vulnerabilities.

Global Economic Prospects

Knowledge Graph entity: WORLD_BANK

Bank of England

A leading central-bank source on money, banking and financial-stability analysis, with a major international financial centre in its remit.

Monetary Policy Report
Financial Stability Report

Knowledge Graph entity: BOE

Current Reading

What deserves attention now

Federal Reserve · 10 July 2026

Monetary Policy Report, July 2026

Monetary policy · Inflation · Financial developments

The Board’s semiannual report to Congress on monetary policy, economic developments and financial conditions.

BIS · 28 June 2026

Annual Economic Report 2026

Financial stability · Fiscal–financial nexus · Inflation

Assesses how the global economy is faring as progress meets rising perils, including a new fiscal–financial stability nexus and shifting inflation dynamics.

World Bank · 11 June 2026

Global Economic Prospects, June 2026

Global growth · Energy prices · Emerging markets

Projects global growth of 2.5% in 2026 and assesses the effect of the Middle East conflict and higher energy prices, with a focus on emerging and developing economies.

OECD · 3 June 2026