This study makes comparison between an emerging economy (Pakistan) and a developed economy (USA) regarding effect of the foreign exchange exposure elasticity on financial distress, idiosyncratic risk, and foreign ownership of the firms. It also tests effect of the global financial crisis 2007-09 on the relationship between the foreign exchange exposure and financial distress of the firms. The study takes all non-financial firms of Pakistan Stock Exchange and all non-financial firms from S&P-500 index of US companies for a period of 2003 to 2015. It conducts a quantitative analysis of panel data of the sample firms followed by views of Chief Finance Officers of the companies. Asset pricing model and rolling regression technique are used for calculating foreign exchange exposure elasticity. It mainly uses multiple regression analysis using White’s Heteroskedasticity-consistent standard errors & covariance test, fixed effect, random effect and Logit model. The results show that the effect of foreign exchange exposure on the financial distress of Pak firms is positively significant at contemporaneous as well as lag level. The effect of the foreign exchange exposure of US manufacturing firms on their financial distress is also positively significant at contemporaneous and lagged level but a weak contemporaneous and lagged effect in case of US non-financial firms. The effect of the global financial crisis is significant during all the three years of the crisis (2007 09) in case of US firms but firms in Pakistan experienced this effect only during 2009. ix This study uses Fama–French three factor model and EGARCH for calculating idiosyncratic risk. The effect of the foreign exchange exposure elasticity on idiosyncratic risk of both the Pakistani and US firms is highly positively significant at contemporaneous as well as at lag level. We find a negative impact of the foreign exchange exposure elasticity on the foreign ownership in the Pakistani firms. In case of the US firms, the relation is insignificant. The study has a number of implications regarding financial stability of the firms, their idiosyncratic risks and of foreign equity. This study is unique on the relation between foreign exchange exposure and financial distress in Pakistan and adds in the literature on USA in this dimension. It also gives a good insight on valuation of firms taking foreign exchange exposure and idiosyncratic risk into consideration. The study makes number of valuable recommendations for carrying out future research on this domain.