On 16-17 September 2010, the Banque de France's Directorate General Economics and International Relations and the Bureau d'économie théorique et appliquée (BETA) of Strasbourg University jointly hosted a conference on the topic "New challenges for public debt in advanced economies" that brought together 70 economists from French and foreign universities, ESCB and other central banks, and European and international institutions.

We propose a two-country dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model of a monetary union facing asymmetric terms-of-trade shocks, calibrated on Nigeria and West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU). Three monetary regimes are successively studied at the union level: a flexible exchange rate with constant money supply, a flexible exchange rate with an accommodating monetary policy and a fixed exchange-rate regime. We find that, in the face of oil-price shocks, the most stabilising regime for Nigeria is a fixed money supply, whereas it is a fixed exchange rate for WAEMU. However, the introduction of an oil-stabilisation fund can reduce the disagreement on the common policy rule. Furthermore, the two zones may agree on a fixed money-supply rule in the face of both oil- and agricultural-price shocks. Copyright 2010 The author 2010. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Centre for the Study of African Economies. All rights reserved. For permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org, Oxford University Press.

We propose a measure of the probability of crises associated with an aggregate indicator, where the percentage of false alarms and the proportion of missed signals can be combined to give an appreciation of the vulnerability of an economy. In this perspective, the important issue is not only to determine whether a system produces true predictions of a crisis, but also whether there are forewarning signs of a forthcoming crisis prior to its actual occurrence. To this end, we adopt the approach initiated by Kaminsky, Lizondo and Reinhart (1998), analyzing each indicator and calculating each threshold separately. We depart from this approach in that each country is also analyzed separately, permitting the creation of a more “custom-made” early warning system for each one. These indicators could help to achieve a guideline, strengthening the domestic capacities to face economic integration and financial stresses.