{"id":32192,"date":"2026-01-26T11:49:56","date_gmt":"2026-01-26T16:49:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/gdp\/?p=32192"},"modified":"2026-02-17T17:02:14","modified_gmt":"2026-02-17T22:02:14","slug":"insights-from-the-january-2026-update-of-the-global-financial-safety-net-tracker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/gdp\/2026\/01\/26\/insights-from-the-january-2026-update-of-the-global-financial-safety-net-tracker\/","title":{"rendered":"Geopolitics on the Rise, IMF on the Decline: Insights from the Updated Global Financial Safety Net Tracker"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Bali, Indonesia. Photo by Bobby McLeod via Unsplash.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By Laurissa M\u00fchlich<\/a>, Marina Zucker-Marques<\/a>\u00a0and Barbara Fritz<\/p>\n

In an era of mounting debt pressures<\/a>, climate shocks<\/a>\u00a0and volatile international trade policies<\/a>, timely and reliable financial resources are critical to stabilize economies without sacrificing essential public spending and development goals. To address this, crisis financing is provided through the Global Financial Safety Net (GFSN)\u2014a network that includes the International Monetary Fund (IMF), regional financial arrangements (RFAs) and central bank currency swap lines. While the GFSN has expanded<\/a> its overall firepower since 2020, its capacity to support countries remains unevenly distributed<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The latest release of the GFSN Tracker<\/a>\u2014an interactive dataset co-produced by the Boston University Global Development Policy Center, Freie Universit\u00e4t Berlin, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and Hochschule f\u00fcr Technik und Wirtschaft Berlin (since Fall 2025)\u2014shows that developing countries continue to face the most limited access to GFSN resources. The database is now updated with crisis finance arrangements signed through December 2025, and the tracker maps both historical and active emergency financing arrangements to offer a comprehensive view of who can access crisis finance, on what terms and at what scale. As Figure 1 shows, high-income countries have more access to the GFSN (measured as share of their gross domestic product) than other income groups.<\/p>\n

Figure 1: Access to the GFSN by Income Group, as Share of GDP (%), 2018-2025<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Source:<\/strong> GFSN Tracker based on data from IMF finances, RFA websites, central bank websites and media reports. For the counting and calculation and classification of swaps, RFA access limits, IMF credit arrangements, see the methodological note.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
2025 Saw the Highest Number of Swaps Since the COVID-19 Pandemic<\/strong><\/h5>\n

The most recent data from the GFSN Tracker suggests that bilateral currency swaps between countries\u2014increasingly seen as a powerful arm of global financial diplomacy\u2014were more active in 2025 than in previous years. In 2025, 19 swap arrangements were made, including two new arrangements\u2014one between Turkey and Kazakhstan and the other between the United States and Argentina. The latter underscores the increasingly geopolitical nature of currency swaps. Although the US Federal Reserve\u2019s swap lines are partly driven<\/a> by political and diplomatic concerns, it mostly targets systemically important<\/a> partners to stabilize global dollar markets. The $20 billion US-Argentina<\/a> swap in 2025 was offered by the US Treasury, rather than the Federal Reserve, indicating that the arrangement was driven less by global dollar liquidity concerns and more by strategic and political considerations. What is more, the swap was explicitly provided by the US to an ideological ally, subject<\/a> to the outcome of the 2025 mid-term elections in Argentina. According to recent financial news, Argentina paid back<\/a> this swap at the beginning of 2026.<\/p>\n

The majority of the 19 swaps made in 2025 involved developing countries as both recipients and providers. The total swap volume for 2025 reached $517 billion, up from roughly $111 billion in 2024, and $93 billion in 2023, but below 2022 levels of $627 billion. As Figure 2 shows, 2025 had a high number of contracts signed involving China, upper-middle-income and high-income countries when compared to the previous two years.<\/p>\n

Figure 2: Number of Participating Countries in a Currency Swap per Year per Income Group, 2020-2025<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Source:<\/strong> GFSN Tracker based on data from central bank websites and media reports. Note:<\/strong> For the counting, calculation and classification of swaps, see the methodological note.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The People\u2019s Bank of China remains a driver of global swap activities, with over 80 contracts signed since 2020. At the same time, more agreements involving emerging markets illustrate a broader South-South search for strategic resilience and access to short-term currency liquidity outside the IMF. A prominent example is the renewal of a currency swap between Brazil and China, which was first put in place in 2013 and lasted for three years before expiring. In 2025, both countries agreed that this new swap arrangement was key to stronger South-South cooperation.<\/p>\n

IMF Lending Activities Lower in 2025 Than in Previous Years<\/strong><\/h5>\n

By comparison, since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, between 2020 and 2025, the IMF counted 241 conditional lending agreements totaling $190 billion, and 137 unconditional lines amounting to $273 billion. Hence, the annual volume of swap arrangements is higher than the short-term liquidity provided by the IMF in the period after COVID-19.<\/p>\n

Figure 3: Number of IMF Lending Agreements by Income Group, 2020-2025<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Source:<\/strong> GFSN Tracker based on data from IMF finances. Note:<\/strong> For the counting, calculation and classification of IMF credit arrangements, see the methodological note.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Most of the unconditional IMF lending\u2014about $273 billion\u2014has gone to nine of the prequalifying countries via the Flexible Credit Line (FCL), Precautionary and Liquidity Line (PLL) and Short-term Liquidity Line (SLL). These facilities continue to serve primarily to signal to investors the policy credibility of qualifying countries, <\/em>as only two countries (North Macedonia<\/a> and Colombia<\/a>) actually drew on them. Since the pandemic, a major part of the lending through the FCL has been provided to Colombia, of which Colombia drew only<\/a> about a third in 2020. Since then, the FCL has been prolonged twice, most recently in 2025, but was canceled<\/a> in April 2025.<\/p>\n

Looking ahead, the asymmetric access to unconditional finance is likely to become even more unequal. During the pandemic, the IMF increased the unconditional financing available to most low-income countries to 150 percent<\/a> of quota. According to a recent IMF Executive Board decision, unconditional IMF crisis finance\u2014such as the Rapid Credit Facility (RCF) and Rapid Financing Instrument (RFI)\u2014will be reduced<\/a> to pre-pandemic levels of 100 percent of quota and possibly less starting in 2027.<\/p>\n

European Neighborhood Liquidity Provision Dominates Regional Crisis Finance<\/strong><\/h5>\n

Meanwhile, RFAs accounted for 66 agreements between 2020 and 2025, totaling nearly $55 billion, half of which supported Ukraine through the European Macro-Financial Assistance (MFA). Further, the largest amounts have been disbursed through the MFA to other countries geographically close to Europe, predominantly Egypt and Jordan. The most actively used RFAs are the EU MFA with 29 lending arrangements since 2020, the Arab Monetary Fund (AMF), utilized 16 times since 2020 and the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) Currency Swap Network, utilized 13 times since 2020.<\/p>\n

Figure 4: Number of RFA Lending Agreements by Income Group, 2020-2025<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Source:<\/strong> GFSN Tracker based on data from RFA websites and annual reports. Note:<\/strong> For the counting, calculation and classification of RFA access limits, see the methodological note.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
Conclusion: Crisis Finance in a Multipolar World <\/strong><\/h5>\n

The January 2026 GFSN Tracker<\/a> update shows an increasing diversification of emergency financing sources, but also underscores the need for policymakers to address persistent gaps in global liquidity provision. The renewed momentum of bilateral swaps\u2014with 19 swap arrangements identified in 2025\u2014underscores two trends: first, financial safety nets are increasingly multipolar\u2014not only anchored in the IMF but also shaped by strategic financial partnerships among emerging economies. The GFSN\u2019s architecture appears to be decentralizing further, blending regional ambitions with global liquidity management.<\/p>\n

Second, financial safety nets are going to be increasingly unequal with unconditional IMF lending windows to close in the foreseeable future. Developing countries\u2014which already have unequal access to GFSN resources, as the tracker demonstrates\u2014will face diminishing access to crisis finance that is immediately available without a string of policy reform obligations. In turn, this will limit their ability to improve crisis resilience.<\/p>\n

Ensuring emergency resources are available for developing countries would require expanding access to the IMF’s unconditional lending facilities, which at least partially address the structural gaps developing countries face in the global swap network. Therefore, it is recommended to maintain the access limits of the IMF’s unconditional lending lines for developing countries\u2014the RFI and the RCF\u2014at their pandemic levels rather than reducing their volumes.<\/p>\n

Further, ensuring emergency resources for developing countries would require expanding access to RFA resources to at least partially address the geographical gaps faced by regions that lack access to RFAs or currency swaps\u2014like Africa, as the GFSN Tracker reveals. It is therefore critical to widen access to regional liquidity pools by stepping up efforts to create new autonomous RFAs. Making RFAs independent from IMF borrowing would also make the use of untapped regional resources more attractive to members, such as in Southeast Asia, as it would lower the political and policy costs of drawing on regional facilities and make them a more credible first line of defense in a crisis.<\/p>\n

For detailed data and methodology, see the latest update of the <\/em>Global Financial Safety Net Tracker<\/em><\/span><\/a>, a joint initiative of Boston University and Freie Universit\u00e4t Berlin, supported by UNCTAD, and Hochschule f\u00fcr Technik und Wirtschaft Berlin.<\/em><\/p>\n

Barbara Fritz is a professor at the Freie Universit\u00e4t Berlin, with a joint appointment at the Department of Economics and the Institute for Latin American Studies<\/em>.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n\u9605\u8bfb\u4e2d\u6587\u535a\u5ba2<\/a>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Laurissa M\u00fchlich, Marina Zucker-Marques\u00a0and Barbara Fritz In an era of mounting debt pressures, climate shocks\u00a0and volatile international trade policies, timely and reliable financial resources are critical to stabilize economies without sacrificing essential public spending and development goals. To address this, crisis financing is provided through the Global Financial Safety Net (GFSN)\u2014a network that includes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18806,"featured_media":32219,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[398,55,156,77,144,1074,58],"tags":[4924,763,3219,3221,3236,506,3132,907,438,3130,459,772,906,2056,1066,3663,908],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/gdp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32192"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/gdp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/gdp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/gdp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18806"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/gdp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32192"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/gdp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32192\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32381,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/gdp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32192\/revisions\/32381"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/gdp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32219"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/gdp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32192"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/gdp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32192"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/gdp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32192"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}