During the past 15 years or so international bank regulation has been concerned mostly with the ability of the system to sustain shocks, such as a stockmarket crash, a foreign-exchange crisis or a terrorist attack.

ECONOMIST: Open wider | The

Its point was to pool members' foreign-exchange reserves to help crisis-hit countries suffering liquidity crunches.

ECONOMIST: Regional economic integration has a long, long way to go

From a historical basis, the G-8 industrialized countries have not intervened in the foreign exchange markets throughout the economic crisis, making intervention impractical and not politically feasible.

FORBES

The biggest emerging markets, with their huge foreign-exchange reserves, appear to be almost crisis-proof (at least outside eastern Europe) in contrast to the seemingly crisis-prone rich world.

ECONOMIST: The path ahead

Gold's surge may indicate that investors fear the next stage of the crisis will occur in the foreign-exchange markets.

ECONOMIST: Central banks and the bullion price

Travelzoo is exposed to general economic trends impacting the overall online travel market such as macroeconomic headwinds led by the European crisis, slowing growth rates in emerging markets and volatile foreign exchange.

FORBES: Key Trends Behind Travelzoo's $26 Stock Value

Regardless of the amount of difficulty involved, the big four emerging markets plus South Africa said earlier this week they were considering setting up a foreign-exchange reserve pool and a currency-swap arrangement in an effort to avoid any credit crisis stemming from the advanced economies.

FORBES: China's Central Bank Willing To Share $3 Trillion

Gross domestic product, foreign exchange reserves, current account surpluses - big numbers are thrown around daily as Asia tries to measure how bad the Crisis is and whether it is bottoming out.

CNN: THE CRISIS PICTURED