Global growth is being held back as countries fail to address imbalances in their current accounts, the International Monetary Fund warned on July 28.

The global level of imbalances, and particularly excess imbalances, which measure the gap between the actual current account balance and the level implied by medium-term fundamentals, stayed broadly flat in 2014, the IMF said.

"Excess deficits narrowed in some cases, but widened in others; progress on reducing excess surpluses has stalled," it