On November 25, 2008, the Federal Reserve unveiled a loan facility to revive the market for asset-backed securities, which had essentially stopped functioning due to the global financial crisis. What are these securities and why is it important for these markets to continue to operate?

This article explains covered bonds and their usefulness as an alternative to mortgage-backed securities for home financing. The use of covered bonds may increase banks’ willingness to issue mortgages, but it can also affect the risk exposure of the deposit insurance fund.

Recent media coverage on the problems in the subprime mortgage market has featured an alphabet soup of abbreviations, such as MBS, CDO, and SIV. What do these terms stand for? And how do they fit into the mortgage financing process?

The heads of state of a broad coalition of nations, the Group of Twenty (G-20), met in September 2009 in Pittsburgh to chart the course of recovery from the financial crisis and set internationally agreed-upon objectives for the reform of regulatory policy.

The authors analyze the usefulness of a new measure of nonfinancial leverage as an early warning indicator for financial instability and its consequences for economic growth.

Last year, Cyprus joined its neighbor Greece on the list of eurozone countries in financial crisis. Although Cyprus is one of the smallest economies in the euro area, following the announcement of the official financial aid package for Cyprus on March 16, 2013, bank investors in the rest of the...