A memo advising a country of our choice on the best course of action right now with respect to their economic and financial policies regarding the global COVID19 pandemic.

Choice of country- Please discuss with me in the chat

With this paper, you are to focus on a country that you know well, or one that you’d like to know well. The only requirement for the country you pick is that it NOT be a country that uses the Euro as its currency or is in the G10 (Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States).
The focus through this pandemic to date has been on the developed nations, many of which have experienced frightening levels of disease, hospitalization and deaths. But the fpcus is shifting now to the other countries that generally don’t have the financial, economic or even political strength to counter the pandemic’s worst economic and financial effects. Many of these countries have fixed exchange rates, so aside from credit and exchange rate risk premia, their interest rates are now zero. But they generally don’t have their fiscal houses in order, so borrowing to have enough money to prop up their economies or their currency (like the U.S. and Europe are doing) isn’t much of an option. Indeed, many second and third-tier countries are experiencing capital outflows — just when they need inflows.
For the country you have chosen, where is their economy at this point? Then track what the effects have been so far on market prices (sovereign debt and equity) as an indication of might be happening with respect to capital flows. In the same vein, analyze what’s been going on with the country’s currency. And investigate whether any international organizations like the IMF are helping out or at the least making promises.
A few weeks ago, the Institute for International Finance published this brief:
https://www.iif.com/Portals/0/Files/content/EV_03172020.pdf (Links to an external site.)
This should give you a good starting point.
Now, having done your research, what you write up for this class is a memo, as described below.
Imagine you are the economic attache to the U.S. Ambassador (or Charge d’Affairs of the U.S. Embassy) in this country. The Ambassador has been asked by the host country, and she has thus asked you, to advise the country on the best course of action right now with respect to their economic and financial policies. Do research on what’s going on, use the theories you learned back in college, and see if you can’t devise the best possible course of action to recommend. Will it be second best? Hey, fourth-best may be the best they can do. They can’t rearrange the global economy and financial markets, but hopefully you can tell them how best to navigate these unprecedented circumstances.
As with all memos to people in power, keep it short and pithy. Demonstrate a good grasp of the facts, but don’t spend a lot of time telling the Ambassador or the local government what they already know. Be practical.

Please use the best of these and outside sources you can find-

The Argument for a V-Shaped Recovery
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-15/morgan-stanley-economists-double-down-on-v-shape-global-recovery?srnd=premium

Links to New Pandemic Material
1- https://tracktherecovery.org/
2- https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-10/virus-splinters-global-economy-exposing-inequality-faultlines?srnd=premium
3- https://www.wsj.com/articles/coronavirus-pandemic-makes-unemployment-calculation-harder-11591781401
4- https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/recovery-tracker/

Interesting graphic of pandemic’s economic effects (And it’s global, too)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2020-05-28/coronavirus-lockdown-crushed-economies-jobs-energy-and-shops?srnd=premium