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Journal Article
Asset Commonality in US Banks and Financial Stability
One potential threat to a stable financial system is the phenomenon of contagion, where a risk that is ordinarily small becomes a problem because of the way it spreads to other institutions. Researchers have investigated multiple channels through which contagion might occur. We look at two?banks borrowing from each other and banks holding similar types of assets?and argue that the latter is a potential source of systemic risk. We review recent data on asset concentrations and capitalization levels of the largest US banks and conclude that the overall risk from this particular contagion ...
Working Paper
Municipal Markets and the Municipal Liquidity Facility
Municipal bond markets experienced a significant amount of strain in response to the COVID-19 crisis, creating liquidity and credit concerns among market participants. During the economic shutdown resulting from the pandemic, income tax revenues were deferred and sales tax revenues decreased beginning in spring 2020, while the cost of borrowing significantly increased for municipal issuers. To aid municipal borrowing needs, the Federal Reserve implemented the Municipal Liquidity Facility (MLF) on April 9, 2020. In this analysis we describe the municipal market conditions as they evolved ...
Working Paper
How Do Banks Respond to Capital Regulation? — The Impact of the Basel III Reforms in the United States
Understanding banks’ responses to capital regulation is essential for regulators to use this key tool of modern banking regulation effectively. We study how and when US banks responded to changes to the way capital ratios are measured, changes that were introduced as part of the adoption of Basel III. We find that small banks — those below USD 10bn — responded neither before nor after the release of the new rules to the change in measured capital they experienced under the new rules. In contrast, we show that regional banks — those with total assets between USD 10bn and USD 50bn — ...
Journal Article
Intergenerational Homeownership and Mortgage Distress
Rates of US homeownership have declined in the past two decades, and the decline has been especially pronounced for young adults. Motivated by recent research that explores the ways in which personal experiences can affect financial attitudes and beliefs, we explore whether the negative homeownership experiences of parents during the 2008 financial crisis could have caused their children to view homeownership less favorably. We find that parental mortgage distress negatively correlates with the probability that a child will purchase a home, and we explore various channels through which this ...
Working Paper
Tail Sensitivity of US Bank Net Interest Margins: A Bayesian Penalized Quantile Regression Approach
Bank net interest margins (NIM) have been historically stable in the US on average, but this stability deteriorated in the post-2020 period, particularly in the tails of the distribution. Recent literature disagrees on the extent to which banks hedge interest rate risk, and past literature shows that credit risk and persistence are also important considerations for bank NIM. I use a novel approach to Bayesian dynamic panel quantile regression to document heterogeneity in US bank NIM estimated sensitivities to interest rates, credit risk, and own persistence. I find increased sensitivity to ...