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Series:Liberty Street Economics 

Discussion Paper
Have Consumers Been Deleveraging?

Since its peak in summer 2008, U.S. consumers? indebtedness has fallen by more than a trillion dollars. Over roughly the same period, charge-offs?the removal of obligations from consumers? credit reports because of defaults?have risen sharply, especially on loans secured by houses, which make up about 80 percent of consumer liabilities. An important question for gauging the behavior of U.S. consumers is how to interpret these two trends. Is the reduction in debts entirely attributable to defaults, or are consumers actively reducing their debts? In this post, we demonstrate that a significant ...
Liberty Street Economics , Paper 20110321

Discussion Paper
Whither Labor Force Participation?

Halting a nearly decade-long downward trend, the U.S. labor force participation rate (LFPR) has flattened since 2016, fluctuating within a narrow range a little below 63 percent. What role has the economy played in this change and what can we expect for the future? In this post, we investigate the extent to which the recent flattening of participation can be attributed to the simultaneous robust improvement in the labor market. We also assess the future path of participation in the medium run should labor market conditions improve further.
Liberty Street Economics , Paper 20180910

Discussion Paper
Is Monetary Policy Still Seasonal?

A 2012 Liberty Street Economics post noted that U.S. monetary policy exhibits a surprising degree of seasonal behavior: over the 1987-2008 period, the Federal Reserve was much more likely to lower interest rates (or abstain from raising rates) in the first month of each quarter than in the two subsequent months. Thirteen years later, we revisit that analysis to investigate whether the seasonal pattern in monetary policy still holds today, in the wake of a rate hiking cycle, a pandemic, a surge in inflation, and a second round of rate hikes. We find that the pattern has indeed continued; ...
Liberty Street Economics , Paper 20251119

Discussion Paper
The Great Moderation, Forecast Uncertainty, and the Great Recession

The Great Recession of 2007-09 was a dramatic macroeconomic event, marked by a severe contraction in economic activity and a significant fall in inflation. These developments surprised many economists, as documented in a recent post on this site. One factor cited for the failure to anticipate the magnitude of the Great Recession was a form of complacency affecting forecasters in the wake of the so-called Great Moderation. In this post, we attempt to quantify the role the Great Moderation played in making the Great Recession appear nearly impossible in the eyes of macroeconomists.
Liberty Street Economics , Paper 20120514

Discussion Paper
Unlocking the Treasury Market through TRACE

The U.S. Treasury market is widely regarded as the deepest and most liquid securities market in the world, playing a critical role in the global economy and in the Federal Reserve’s implementation of monetary policy. Despite the Treasury market’s importance, the official sector has historically had limited access to information on cash market transactions. This data gap was most acutely demonstrated in the investigation of the October 15, 2014, flash event in the Treasury market, as highlighted in the Joint Staff Report (JSR). Following the JSR, steps were taken to improve regulators’ ...
Liberty Street Economics , Paper 20180928b

Discussion Paper
The Indirect Costs of Lehman’s Bankruptcy

In our previous post, we assessed losses to customers and clients from foregone opportunities after Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy in September 2008. In this post, we examine losses to Lehman and its investors in anticipation of bankruptcy. For example, if bankruptcy is expected, Lehman’s earnings may decline as customers close their accounts or certain securities (such as derivatives) to which Lehman is a counterparty may lose value. We estimate these losses by analyzing Lehman’s earnings and stock, bond, and credit default swap (CDS) prices.
Liberty Street Economics , Paper 20190117

Discussion Paper
How (Un-)Informed Are Depositors in a Banking Panic? A Lesson from History

How informed or uninformed are bank depositors in a banking crisis? Can depositors anticipate which banks will fail? Understanding the behavior of depositors in financial crises is key to evaluating the policy measures, such as deposit insurance, designed to prevent them. But this is difficult in modern settings. The fact that bank runs are rare and deposit insurance universal implies that it is rare to be able to observe how depositors would behave in absence of the policy. Hence, as empiricists, we are lacking the counterfactual of depositor behavior during a run that is undistorted by the ...
Liberty Street Economics , Paper 20220217

Discussion Paper
Does the Equity Term Structure Respond to Monetary Policy Shocks?

A long-standing body of research, inspired by Bernanke and Kuttner (2005), has documented the effects of Fed interest rate surprises on stock markets. While stock markets provide valuable information about the investor risk premium and dividend growth expectations, researchers have only recently developed more comprehensive tools to estimate the term structure of equity risk premia and dividend growth expectations across a broad range of maturities. In this post, we investigate the impact of monetary policy surprises (or shocks) on short- and long-term estimates of risk premia and growth ...
Liberty Street Economics , Paper 20260812

Discussion Paper
Treasury Market When-Issued Trading Activity

When the U.S. Treasury sells a new security, the security is announced to the public, auctioned a number of days later, and then issued sometime after that. When-issued (WI) trading refers to trading of the new security after the announcement but before issuance. Such trading promotes price discovery, which may reduce uncertainty at auction, potentially lowering government borrowing costs. Despite the importance of WI trading, and the advent of Treasury trading volume statistics from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), little is known publicly about the level of WI activity. ...
Liberty Street Economics , Paper 20201130

Discussion Paper
Coronavirus Outbreak Sends Consumer Expectations Plummeting

The New York Fed’s Center for Microeconomic Data released results today from its March 2020 Survey of Consumer Expectations (SCE), which provides information on consumers' economic expectations and behavior. In particular, the survey covers respondents’ views on how income, spending, inflation, credit access, and housing and labor market conditions will evolve over time. The March survey, which was fielded between March 2 and 31, records a substantial deterioration in financial and economic expectations, including sharp declines in household income and spending growth expectations. As ...
Liberty Street Economics , Paper 20200406b

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