Financial instruments in levels 2 and 3 for accounting purposes are complex and opaque products and their evaluation is problematic. The amount of these assets held by banks in Europe is exceptionally high (€3 trillion in 2019) and there is no empirical evidence as to the extent, if at all, to...

The opacity of the banking business has been identified as a main source of stock crash risk. Level 3 financial instruments are particularly opaque products, as their fair value is neither directly available nor measurable using market prices. Focusing on Europe, we find robust evidence that L3...