How did problems in a relatively small portion of the home mortgage market trigger the most severe financial crisis in the United States since the Great Depression? Several developments played a role, including the proliferation of complex mortgage-backed securities and derivatives with highly...

This article was originally presented as the Homer Jones Memorial Lecture, organized by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri, April 15, 2009.

The authors document the provision of liquidity in Swiss francs (CHF) by the Swiss National Bank (SNB) to banks located outside Switzerland during the recent financial crisis. What makes the Swiss case special is the size of this liquidity provision—at times, 80 percent of all short-term CHF...

The number of U.S. commercial banks and savings institutions declined by 12 percent between December 31, 2006, and December 31, 2010, continuing a consolidation trend begun in the mid-1980s. Banking industry consolidation has been marked by sharply higher shares of deposits held by the largest...

The 2007-09 financial and economic crisis was the result of a lack of effective regulation. The author addresses the problems with regulations in effect at the time of the crisis and offers proposals for regulation reform to address future crises. He notes that reforms should be based on solid...

The developing international debt crisis has unleashed unanticipated fears that governments in some advanced economies may default on their sovereign debt and trigger a global financial tsunami. This article provides a primer on sovereign debt sustainability and interprets the recent experience...

Numerous commentaries have questioned both the legality and appropriateness of Federal Reserve lending to banks during the recent financial crisis. This article addresses two questions motivated by such commentary: Did the Federal Reserve violate either the letter or spirit of the law by lending...

Since its inception in the early nineteenth century, the U.S. commercial paper market has grown to become a key source of short-term funding for major businesses, with issuance averaging over $100 billion per day. In the fall of 2008, the commercial paper market achieved national prominence when...

The financial crisis of 2007-09 is widely viewed as the worst financial disruption since the Great Depression of 1929-33. However, the accompanying economic recession was mild compared with the Great Depression, though severe by postwar standards. Aggressive monetary, fiscal, and financial...

This article is a modified version of remarks given at the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia’s policy forum “Policy Lessons from the Economic and Financial Crisis,” December 4, 2009. The presentation was made during a panel discussion that also included James Bullard and John Taylor.