An important research area of the corporate yield spread literature seeks to measure the proportion of the spread that can be explained by factors such as the possibility of default, liquidity, tax differentials and market risk. We contribute to this literature by assessing the ability of...

Whereas recent studies on revolving lines of credit suggest a positive relationship between exposure at default and default probability on the line, this paper considers the relationship between two financial instruments through the simultaneous analysis of credit line utilization and default...

Two models of default risk are prominent in the financial literature: Merton's structural model and Altman's reduced-form model. The former has the benefit of being responsive, since the probabilities of default can continually be updated with the evolution of firms' asset values. Its main flaw...

Credit risk is the major challenge for risk managers and market regulators. Banks, regulators and central banks do not agree on how to measure credit risk and, more particularly, on how to compute the optimal capital that is necessary for protecting the different partners that share this risk....