# Ka Lok Wong (Steve) — full site content for LLMs This file mirrors the content of https://stevekwong.com for language models and AI agents. Short index version: https://stevekwong.com/llms.txt Last updated: July 2026. --- ## About / Home (https://stevekwong.com/) Ka Lok Wong (Steve) is a macroeconomist (Associate Economic Affairs Officer) at the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) in Addis Ababa, working on growth, fiscal, and debt issues across the continent. He completed his PhD in Economics at the Geneva Graduate Institute. His work sits between International Finance, Macroeconomics, and Public Economics, with heavy use of macroeconomic data engineering (Stata, Python, APIs, and the African Debt Database). Views are his own, not of his employer. - Name: Ka Lok Wong. Also known as: Steve, Steve Wong, Steve K.L. Wong. - Location: Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. - Email: ka.wong@un.org - Website: https://stevekwong.com - LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevekwong/ - GitHub: https://github.com/steveklwong - Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=xSzB9K4AAAAJ - RePEc/IDEAS: https://ideas.repec.org/f/pwo351.html - ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7590-0703 - CEPR: https://cepr.org/about/people/ka-lok-wong Expertise: sovereign debt; African domestic debt markets; debt transparency; debt governance; emerging-market sovereign bond issuance (volume, maturity, currency denomination); fiscal policy; exchange-rate pass-through to tax revenues; renminbi trade invoicing; macroeconomic data tools. --- ## Research (https://stevekwong.com/research) ### Determinants of Sovereign Bond Issuance in Emerging Markets First-authored, with Mark Manger (University of Toronto) and Ugo Panizza (Geneva Graduate Institute, CEPR). CEPR Discussion Paper 21251 (2025); forthcoming, Oxford Review of Economic Policy. Abstract: Emerging market economies (EMEs) regularly tap domestic and international capital markets through scheduled sovereign bond auctions. The paper leverages a novel dataset covering over 75,000 sovereign issuance events and 20,000 securities from 20 EMEs between the early 2000s and 2023 to analyze the determinants of bond issuance choices, focusing on volume, maturity, and currency denomination. Local currency debt issuance is largely associated with refinancing needs, while foreign currency issuance reflects more strategic and cyclical considerations — correlating with global macroeconomic conditions, interest rate differentials, and investor sentiment. EME governments differentiate their debt management strategies by currency of issuance: local currency issuance is shaped by domestic budget mechanics, foreign currency issuance by external constraints and opportunities. Links: https://repository.graduateinstitute.ch/record/321541 (working paper), https://cepr.org/publications/dp21251 (CEPR DP), https://cepr.org/voxeu/columns/how-emerging-markets-borrow-new-evidence-sovereign-bond-issuance (VoxEU column). ### Africa's Domestic Debt Boom: Evidence from the African Debt Database With Mark Manger, David Mihalyi, Ugo Panizza, Niccolò Rescia, Christoph Trebesch. CEPR Discussion Paper 20747 (2025). Abstract: Introduces the African Debt Database (ADD) — a new, comprehensive dataset tracing both domestic and external debt instruments at a granular level, with a detailed mapping of Africa's domestic debt markets drawn from government auction reports and bond prospectuses. Covers over 50,000 individual government loans and securities issued by 54 African countries between 2000 and 2024, totalling about USD 6.3 trillion. For each instrument it provides harmonized micro-level information on currency, maturity, interest rates, instrument type, and creditor. Four stylized facts: (i) rapid expansion of domestic debt markets, especially in middle-income countries; (ii) wide dispersion in borrowing costs and real interest rates; (iii) large cross-country differences in maturity structures and rollover risks; (iv) rising debt-service burden, particularly due to international bonds. Debt transparency is both feasible and valuable, even in data-scarce environments. Links: https://africandebtdatabase.com (project site and data), https://cepr.org/publications/dp20747 (CEPR DP), https://cepr.org/voxeu/columns/africas-domestic-debt-boom-new-evidence-african-debt-database (VoxEU), https://voxdev.org/topic/methods-measurement/africas-domestic-debt-boom-new-evidence-african-debt-database (VoxDev). ### Monetary Shocks and Fiscal Consequences: Exchange Rate Pass-Through to ### Tax Revenues in EMs (work in progress, under major revision) Single-authored. Investigates how an exogenous depreciation against the U.S. dollar affects corporate profits and government revenues. Using country-level panel regressions (OLS and GMM) alongside a calibrated New Keynesian DSGE model, shows that domestic-currency depreciation raises corporate income tax and total tax revenue in the short run, driven by valuation effects and demand expansion under different currency-pricing regimes. ### China and the Currency of Invoicing: Market Size, Geography, and the ### Rise of the Renminbi (work in progress, under major revision) Single-authored. Draws on a novel dataset of commodity deliveries in Chinese exchanges and country-year export invoicing shares to explore how China's growing role as a trade partner and commodity exchange operator influences exporters' currency choices. --- ## Speaking Open to conference panels, policy roundtables, and academic or policy seminars, in person or remote — on African domestic debt markets, debt transparency and debt data, sovereign bond issuance in emerging markets, debt governance and domestic capital markets, and exchange rates and the fiscal sector. Contact: ka.wong@un.org --- ## Policy contributions - Economic Report on Africa 2026, United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, April 2026. https://repository.uneca.org/entities/publication/e06ada07-a490-43bf-a1a7-d53a1c6b2e89 - Economic Report on Africa 2025, United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, March 2025. https://repository.uneca.org/entities/publication/ffc1fc2f-c9f5-4631-856b-a6836c0837a5 - Policy Brief and Full Paper: The Impacts of the Middle East Conflict on African Economies. AfDB–AUC–UNECA–UNDP Task Force, April 2026. https://www.undp.org/africa/publications/policy-paper-impacts-middle-east-conflict-african-economies ## Media - The Economist, "Africa's other debt crisis" (20 November 2025): coverage of Africa's domestic debt landscape, drawing in part on the African Debt Database and related work on sovereign financing. https://www.economist.com/middle-east-and-africa/2025/11/20/africas-other-debt-crisis --- ## CV (https://stevekwong.com/cv) Full CV (PDF): https://stevekwong.com/files/CV_Wong_20Nov2025.pdf Employment: - Economist (Associate Economic Affairs Officer), United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), Macroeconomics, Finance and Governance Division (MFGD). YPP programme, Economic Affairs. Addis Ababa, Feb 2025 – present. - PhD Researcher, Centre for Finance and Development, Geneva Graduate Institute (SNIS project on sovereign debt). Geneva, 2022–2024. - Consultant / Research Intern, International Labour Organization (ILO). Bangkok / Geneva, 2019–2022. Education: - PhD in International Economics, Geneva Graduate Institute (IHEID), 2021–2025, summa cum laude. Thesis: Essays in International Finance and Macroeconomics. - MA in International Economics, Geneva Graduate Institute (IHEID), 2020–2021 (fast-track to PhD). - MSc in Economic History, London School of Economics, 2017–2018, Merit. - BA in Culture Management, City University of Hong Kong, 2013–2017, First. Research assistance during PhD: to Ugo Panizza (2022), Philippe Bacchetta (2021–22), Richard Baldwin & Jonathan Dingle (2021). Skills: Python, Stata, Matlab, Dynare, R, LaTeX; Bloomberg, Refinitiv DataStream, ORBIS, S&P Capital IQ, assorted APIs. --- ## Data & Code (https://stevekwong.com/data) Reproducible Python/Stata guides and notebooks for macroeconomic data work: World Bank WDI API, IMF WEO API, UN Comtrade API, BIS FX statistics API, UNCTAD unit value indices, African Debt Database maturing bonds, country identifier harmonization, datetime handling, exporting to Excel/Stata. Sub-guides: - https://stevekwong.com/comtrade — Stata/Python workflows for the UN Comtrade API. - https://stevekwong.com/jupyter-setup — Jupyter setup in enterprise environments. - https://stevekwong.com/lp-excel-guide — local projection impulse-response charts in Excel/Stata, with templates. - https://stevekwong.com/country-plot — "country ball" plots in Python, with notebook.