We construct a new systemic risk measure that quantifies vulnerability to fire-sale spillovers using detailed regulatory balance sheet data for U.S. commercial banks and repo market data for broker-dealers. Even for moderate shocks in normal times, fire-sale externalities can be substantial. For...

We propose a measure for systemic risk: CoVaR, the value at risk (VaR) of financial institutions conditional on other institutions being in distress. We define an institution's (marginal) contribution to systemic risk as the difference between CoVaR and the financial system's VaR. From our...

We investigate the drivers of daily changes in the exchange value of the Chinese currency (CNY) since early 2016, when a new regime was introduced for setting the fix - the midpoint of the CNY's daily trading range against the U.S. dollar. Daily changes in the fix, which is announced just prior...

This paper explores the advantages of a new financial charter for large, complex, internationally active financial institutions that would address the corporate governance challenges of such organizations, including incentive problems in risk decisions and the complicated corporate and...

Which markets do institutions use to change exposure to credit risk? Using a unique data set of transactions in corporate bonds and credit default swaps (CDS) by large financial institutions, we show that simultaneous transactions in both markets are rare, with an average institution having an...

We employ a model of leverage-induced explosive behavior in financial markets to develop a measure of financial market instability. Specifically, we derive a quantitative condition for how large levered investors can become relative to the whole market before the demand curve for securities...

The goal of integrated risk management in a financial institution is to measure and manage risk and capital across a range of diverse business activities. This requires an approach for aggregating risk types (market, credit, and operational) whose distributional shapes vary considerably. In this...

This paper, originally released in August 1989 as part of a Federal Reserve Bank of New York series on the U.S. securities markets, examines loans of Treasury and agency securities in the domestic market. It highlights some important institutional characteristics of securities loan transactions,...

In a financial system in which balance sheets are continuously marked to market, asset price changes appear immediately as changes in net worth, eliciting responses from financial intermediaries who adjust the size of their balance sheets. We document evidence that marked-to-market leverage is...

In responding to the severity and broad scope of the financial crisis that began in 2007, the Federal Reserve has made aggressive use of both traditional monetary policy instruments and innovative tools in an effort to provide liquidity. In this paper, I examine the Fed's actions in light of the...