This paper constructs risk-free interest rates implicit in index option prices for ten of the major G11 currencies. We compare these rates to the yields of government bonds to provide international estimates of the convenience yield earned by safe assets. Average convenience yields across...

Hedge funds significantly reduced their equity holdings during the recent financial crisis. In 2008Q3-Q4, hedge funds sold about 29% of their aggregate portfolio. Redemptions and margin calls were the primary drivers of selloffs. Consistent with forced deleveraging, the selloffs took place in...

Using only daily data on bond and stock returns, we identify and characterize flight to safety (FTS) episodes for 23 countries. On average, FTS days comprise less than 3% of the sample, and bond returns exceed equity returns by 2.5 to 4%. The majority of FTS events are country-specific not...

We examine the relationship between monetary policy operations and interbank borrowing and lending of funds using sovereign bonds as collateral. We first establish that, in the precrisis period, there are important but rather weak relations between these funding sources and that this...

During the COVID-19 market crash, U.S. stocks with higher institutional ownership -- in particular, those held more by active, short-term, and more exposed institutions -- performed worse. Portfolio changes through the first quarter of 2020 reveal that institutional investors prioritized...

Using high-frequency data we document that episodes of market turmoil in the European sovereign bond market are on average associated with large decreases in trading volume. The response of trading volume to market stress is conditional on transaction costs. Low transaction cost turmoil episodes...

We show that limited dealer participation in the market, coupled with an informational friction resulting from high frequency trading, can induce demand for liquidity to be upward sloping and strategic complementarities in traders' liquidity consumption decisions: traders demand more liquidity...

Over two decades, ETFs have become one of the most popular investment vehicle among retail and professional investors due to their low transaction costs and high liquidity, taking market share from traditional investment vehicles such as mutual funds and index futures. Research has shown that in...

Relying on a perspective borrowed from monetary policy announcements and introducing an econometric twist in the traditional event study analysis, we document the existence of an "event risk transfer", namely a significant credit risk transmission from the sovereign to the corporate sector after...

This study provides new evidence on the relationship between unconventional monetary policy and auction cycles in the euro area. Using proprietary data on purchases of public sector securities implemented by the Eurosystem, the paper examines the flow effects of asset purchase programmes on...