However, owing to the inherent difficulties of distinguishing reliably between sustainable and unsustainable debt burdens, the IMF has used exceptional access as a rule rather than an exception in the recent past.
Not surprisingly, in many instances the objective of helping to restore market access was not achieved and, what is more, this approach became the root cause of moral hazard and more volatile capital flows. In order to roll back the part played by exceptional access it will be necessary to introduce additional safeguards.