THAILAND, 1997

For most of the 1990's, Thailand's economy was one of the fastest growing in the world. Thailand was popular with foreign investors, and the country's currency was stable due to the central bank's currency peg. However, overspeculation, high interest rates, lower than expected exports and job losses were causing speculation that the central bank would abandon the currency peg. The Bank of Thailand must decide whether to continue or to abandon the peg of the baht to the U.S. dollar. Was the country through the worst of the economic problems or was there more to come? The supplementary cases enable role plays designed to provide an understanding of the forces influencing a decision about appropriate monetary policy as importer (9B01M022 - Exclusive Autos of Bangkok), exporter (9B01M023 - Thai Shoes PCL), investor (9B01M027 - International Assets Investment Company), lender (9B01M026 - Hokkaido Bank), currency speculator (9B01M029 - Quantile Investment Fund), the IMF (9B01M028 - International Monetary Fund), and the Bank of Thailand (9B01M025 - Bank of Thailand in June 1997).