We document the twin crisis that affected Spain in the mid-1860s. First, we trace back its origins to the international crisis of 1864-66. Next, we describe the particular banking sector of Spain, characterized by the coexistence of the Bank of Spain with multiple local banks of issue. We...

The classical Bagehot’s conception of a Lender of Last Resort (LOLR) that lends to illiquid banks has been criticized on two grounds: on the one hand, the distinction between insolvency and illiquidity is not clear cut; on the other a fully collateralized repo market allows Central Banks to...

We evaluate the ECB’s monetary policy strategy against the underlying economic structure of the euro area economy, in normal times and in times of severe financial dislocations. We show that in the years preceding the financial crisis that started in 2007 the strategy was successful at...

Accounting standard setters are considering the wider use of fair value accounting. This paper focuses on the financial stability implications of a move in the banking sector from the current accounting framework to full fair value accounting. A simulation exercise is performed on how various...

Following the adoption by the Basel Committee of new capital rules for banks, a process is now taking place in the EU to transpose the rules into Community law and, ultimately, into national legislation. This paper gives an overview of the main issues that relate to the EU implementation, mainly...

This paper investigates the potential impact of the growing influence of the opinions of credit rating agencies (CRAs) on market dynamics. This impact can be seen as a consequence of the information content of the ratings themselves or indirectly as a consequence of the "hardwiring" of ratings...

While consumption habits have been utilised as a means of generating a hump shapedoutput response to monetary policy shocks in sticky-price New Keynesian economies,there is relatively little analysis of the impact of habits (particularly, external habits) onoptimal policy. In this paper we...