How Bank Reserves Are Distributed Matters. How You Measure Their Distribution Matters Too.

Afonso, Gara; Cipriani, Marco; Clampitt, Steph; Jendoubi, Haitham; La Spada, Gabriele; Riordan, Will

Discussion Paper

How Bank Reserves Are Distributed Matters. How You Measure Their Distribution Matters Too.

Abstract: Changes in the distribution of banks’ reserve balances are important since they may impact conditions in the federal funds market and alter trading dynamics in money markets more generally. In this post, we propose using the Lorenz curve and Gini coefficient as a new approach to measuring reserve concentration. Since 2013, concentration, as captured by the Lorenz curve and the Gini coefficient, has co-moved with aggregate reserves, decreasing as aggregate reserves declined (such as in 2015-18) and increasing as aggregate reserves increased (such as at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic).

Keywords: reserves; concentration; COVID-19;

JEL Classification: G1;