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Working Paper
Mandatory Disclosure and Financial Contagion
This paper analyzes the welfare implications of mandatory disclosure of losses at financial institutions when it is common knowledge that some banks have incurred losses but not which ones. We develop a model that features contagion, meaning that banks not hit by shocks may still suffer losses because of their exposure to banks that are. In addition, we assume banks can profitably invest funds provided by outsiders, but will divert these funds if their equity is low. Investors thus value knowing which banks were hit by shocks to assess the equity of the banks they invest in. We find that when ...
Working Paper
Value Added and Productivity Linkages Across Countries
What is the relationship between international trade and business cycle synchronization? Using data from 40 countries, we find that GDP comovement is significantly associated with trade in intermediate inputs but not with trade in final goods. Motivated by this new fact, we build a model of international trade that is able to replicate the empirical trade-comovement slope, offering the first quantitative solution for the Trade Comovement Puzzle. The model relies on (i) global value chains, (ii) price distortions due to monopolistic competition and (iii) fluctuations in the mass of firms ...
Working Paper
Global Trade and GDP Co-Movement
We revisit the association between trade and GDP comovement for 135 countries from 1970 to 2009. Guided by a simple theory, we introduce two notions of trade linkages: (i) the usual direct bilateral trade index and (ii) new indexes of common exposure to third countries capturing the role of similarity in trade networks. Both measures are economically and statistically associated with GDP correlation, suggesting an additional channel through which GDP fluctuations propagate through trade linkages. Moreover, high income countries become more synchronized when the content of their trade is ...
Working Paper
The Heterogeneous Impact of Referrals on Labor Market Outcomes
We document a new set of facts regarding the impact of referrals on labor market outcomes. Our results highlight the importance of distinguishing between different types of referrals—those from family and friends and those from business contacts—and different occupations. Then we develop an on-the-job search model that incorporates referrals and calibrate the model to key moments in the data. The calibrated model yields new insights into the roles played by different types of referrals in the match formation process and provides quantitative estimates of the effects of referrals on ...
Discussion Paper
Assessing Contagion Risk in a Financial Network
Since the 2008 financial crisis, there has been an explosion of research trying to understand and quantify the default spillovers that can arise through counterparty risk. This first of two posts delves into the analysis of financial network contagion through this spillover channel. The authors introduce a framework, originally developed by Eisenberg and Noe, that is useful for thinking about default cascades.
Working Paper
Efficient Public Good Provision in Networks : Revisiting the Lindahl Solution
The provision of public goods in developing countries is a central challenge. This paper studies a model where each agent?s effort provides heterogeneous benefits to the others, inducing a network of opportunities for favor-trading. We focus on a classical efficient benchmark ? the Lindahl solution ? that can be derived from a bargaining game. Does the optimistic assumption that agents use an efficient mechanism (rather than succumbing to the tragedy of the commons) imply incentives for efficient investment in the technology that is used to produce the public goods? To show that the answer is ...
Working Paper
Identifying Contagion in a Banking Network
We present the first micro-level evidence of the transmission of shocks through financial networks. Using the network of credit default swap (CDS) transactions between banks, we identify bank CDS returns attributable to counterparty losses. A bank's own CDS spread increases whenever counterparties from whom it has purchased default protection themselves experience losses. We find no such effect from losses of non-counterparties, nor from counterparties to whom the bank has sold protection. The effect on bank CDS returns through this counterparty loss channel is large relative to the direct ...
Discussion Paper
How Large are Default Spillovers in the U.S. Financial System?
When a financial firm defaults on its counterparties, the counterparties may in turn become unable to pay their own creditors, and so on. This domino effect can quickly propagate through the financial system, creating undesirable spillovers and unnecessary defaults. In this post, the authors use the framework discussed in the first post of this two-part series to answer the question: How vulnerable is the U.S. financial system to default spillovers?
Working Paper
Community Leaders and the Preservation of Cultural Traits
We explain persistent differences in cultural traits of immigrant groups with the presence of community leaders. Leaders influence the cultural traits of their community, which have an impact on the group?s earnings. They determine whether a community will be more assimilated and wealthier or less assimilated and poorer. With a leader, cultural integration remains incomplete. The leader chooses more distinctive cultural traits in high-productivity environments and if the community is more connected. Lump-sum transfers to immigrants can hinder cultural integration. These findings are in line ...