Credit default swaps (CDS) provide the buyer with insurance against certain types of credit events by entitling him to exchange any of the bonds permitted as deliverable against their par value. Unlike bonds, whose risk spreads are assumed to be the product of default risk and loss rate, CDS are...

task has become particularly challenging in European advanced economies where expectations of low growth and limits to monetary policy support are shifting the burden of adjustment onto fiscal consolidation. The SDN will investigate the main drivers behind successful past debt reversals,...

This paper examines how emerging bond markets react to macroeconomic announcements. Global bond spreads respond to rating actions and changes in global interest rates rather than domestic data and policy announcements. All announcements affect market volatility. Data and policy announcements...

Small emerging economies, despite their significant growth, lack the scale to develop thriving capital markets from their local investor and issuer base that are able to deliver the benefits of a large, mature market. Slovenia is such an example. Despite the necessary infrastructure in place,...

In housing crises, high mortgage debt can feed a vicious circle of falling housing prices and declining consumption and incomes, leading to higher mortgage defaults and deeper recessions. In such situations, resolution policies may need to be adapted to help contain negative feedback loops while...

This paper introduces a new dataset on the composition of the investor base for government securities in the G20 advanced economies and the euro area. During the last decades, investors from abroad have increased their presence in government bond markets. The financial crisis broke this trend....

The enhanced Stability and Growth Pact calls on euro area members and aspirants to set boundaries to fiscal deficits through high-level legislation. A limit on the deficit, such as the deficit ceiling in Bulgaria's organic budget law, serves to protect solvency. The recent crisis clearly...

This note outlines the basic economics of the shadow banking system, highlights (systemic) risks related to it, and suggests implications for measurement and regulatory approaches.

On a credit rating-adjusted basis, spreads on U.S. high-yield debt have typically been regarded as a lower bound for emerging market debt. However in the C-rated and defaulted segment, emerging market debt has traded at lower spreads than similarly rated U.S. high yield debt. We show that the...

The paper finds significant deviations between short-term emerging market real interest rates and world real interest rates primarily due to the inflationary expectations of the local investor base. We test for long-run real interest convergence in emerging markets using a time varying panel...