Quantifying Systemic Risk


Book Description

In the aftermath of the recent financial crisis, the federal government has pursued significant regulatory reforms, including proposals to measure and monitor systemic risk. However, there is much debate about how this might be accomplished quantitatively and objectively—or whether this is even possible. A key issue is determining the appropriate trade-offs between risk and reward from a policy and social welfare perspective given the potential negative impact of crises. One of the first books to address the challenges of measuring statistical risk from a system-wide persepective, Quantifying Systemic Risk looks at the means of measuring systemic risk and explores alternative approaches. Among the topics discussed are the challenges of tying regulations to specific quantitative measures, the effects of learning and adaptation on the evolution of the market, and the distinction between the shocks that start a crisis and the mechanisms that enable it to grow.




Systemic Contingent Claims Analysis


Book Description

The recent global financial crisis has forced a re-examination of risk transmission in the financial sector and how it affects financial stability. Current macroprudential policy and surveillance (MPS) efforts are aimed establishing a regulatory framework that helps mitigate the risk from systemic linkages with a view towards enhancing the resilience of the financial sector. This paper presents a forward-looking framework ("Systemic CCA") to measure systemic solvency risk based on market-implied expected losses of financial institutions with practical applications for the financial sector risk management and the system-wide capital assessment in top-down stress testing. The suggested approach uses advanced contingent claims analysis (CCA) to generate aggregate estimates of the joint default risk of multiple institutions as a conditional tail expectation using multivariate extreme value theory (EVT). In addition, the framework also helps quantify the individual contributions to systemic risk and contingent liabilities of the financial sector during times of stress.




Regulating Wall Street


Book Description

Experts from NYU Stern School of Business analyze new financial regulations and what they mean for the economy The NYU Stern School of Business is one of the top business schools in the world thanks to the leading academics, researchers, and provocative thinkers who call it home. In Regulating Wall Street: The New Architecture of Global Finance, an impressive group of the Stern school’s top authorities on finance combine their expertise in capital markets, risk management, banking, and derivatives to assess the strengths and weaknesses of new regulations in response to the recent global financial crisis. Summarizes key issues that regulatory reform should address Evaluates the key components of regulatory reform Provides analysis of how the reforms will affect financial firms and markets, as well as the real economy The U.S. Congress is on track to complete the most significant changes in financial regulation since the 1930s. Regulating Wall Street: The New Architecture of Global Finance discusses the impact these news laws will have on the U.S. and global financial architecture.




Systemic Risk in the Financial Sector


Book Description

The 2008 global financial crisis brought the world's economy closer to collapse than ever before. Has enough been done to prevent another crisis?




Risk Topography


Book Description

The recent financial crisis and the difficulty of using mainstream macroeconomic models to accurately monitor and assess systemic risk have stimulated new analyses of how we measure economic activity and the development of more sophisticated models in which the financial sector plays a greater role. Markus Brunnermeier and Arvind Krishnamurthy have assembled contributions from leading academic researchers, central bankers, and other financial-market experts to explore the possibilities for advancing macroeconomic modeling in order to achieve more accurate economic measurement. Essays in this volume focus on the development of models capable of highlighting the vulnerabilities that leave the economy susceptible to adverse feedback loops and liquidity spirals. While these types of vulnerabilities have often been identified, they have not been consistently measured. In a financial world of increasing complexity and uncertainty, this volume is an invaluable resource for policymakers working to improve current measurement systems and for academics concerned with conceptualizing effective measurement.




Globalization and Systemic Risk


Book Description

The impact of globalization of financial markets is a highly debated topic, particularly in recent months when the issue of globalization and contagion of financial distress has become a focus of intense policy debate. The papers in this volume provide an up-to-date overview of the key issues in this debate. While most of the contributions were prepared after the initial outbreak of the current global turmoil and financial crisis, they identify the relative strengths of the risk diversification and risk transmission processes and examine the empirical evidence to date. The book considers the relative roles of banks, nonbank financial institutions and capital markets in both risk diversification and risk transmission. It then evaluates the current status of crisis resolution in a global context, and speculates where to go from here in terms of understanding, resolution, prevention and public policy.




The Financing of Catastrophe Risk


Book Description

Is it possible that the insurance and reinsurance industries cannot handle a major catastrophe? Ten years ago, the notion that the overall cost of a single catastrophic event might exceed $10 billion was unthinkable. With ever increasing property-casualty risks and unabated growth in hazard-prone areas, insurers and reinsurers now envision the possibility of disaster losses of $50 to $100 billion in the United States. Against this backdrop, the capitalization of the insurance and reinsurance industries has become a crucial concern. While it remains unlikely that a single event might entirely bankrupt these industries, a big catastrophe could place firms under severe stress, jeopardizing both policy holders and investors and causing profound ripple effects throughout the U.S. economy. The Financing of Catastrophe Risk assembles an impressive roster of experts from academia and industry to explore the disturbing yet realistic assumption that a large catastrophic event is inevitable. The essays offer tangible means of both reassessing and raising the level of preparedness throughout the insurance and reinsurance industries.







Sub-National Credit Risk and Sovereign Bailouts


Book Description

Studies have shown that markets may underprice sub-national governments’ risk on the implicit assumption that these entities would be bailed out by their central government in case of financial difficulties. However, the question of whether sovereigns pay a premium on their own borrowing as a result of (implicitly or explicitly) guaranteeing sub-entities’ debt has been explored only little. We use an event study approach with separate equations for two levels of government to test for a simultaneous increase in sovereign risk premia and decrease in sub-national risk premia—or a de facto transfer of risk from the latter to the former—on the day a sovereign bailout is announced. Using daily financial market data for Spain and its autonomous regions from January 2010 to June 2013, we find support for our risk transfer hypothesis. We estimate that the Spanish sovereign’s spread may have increased by around 70 basis points as a result of the central government’s support for fiscally distressed comunidades autónomas.




Managing the Sovereign-Bank Nexus


Book Description

This paper reviews empirical and theoretical work on the links between banks and their governments (the bank-sovereign nexus). How significant is this nexus? What do we know about it? To what extent is it a source of concern? What is the role of policy intervention? The paper concludes with a review of recent policy proposals.