Case Study: The Asian Financial Crisis of 1997 and Its Regional Ripple Effects

A plain-language case study of the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis, told from an Indian investor's seat. The course opens with the 'Asian Miracle' decade and the weak points hidden underneath it: currencies pegged to the dollar, short-term foreign borrowing and companies that earned in local currency but owed in dollars. It then follows the crisis from Thailand's decision to float the baht on 2 July 1997 through the contagion that hit Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Hong Kong and South Korea, and looks at the very different responses: the IMF rescue packages, Malaysia's capital controls and Hong Kong's defence of its peg. The final chapter explains why India escaped the worst, how the rupee and RBI still felt the pressure, how the shock travelled on to Russia and LTCM in 1998, and the lessons on forex reserves, currency mismatch and hot money that still shape how Indian investors should read a crisis in another emerging market.