This сhapter focuses on the assessment and management of ALM risks: liquidity risk and interest-rate risk. The first part is devoted to liquidity risk: various types of liquidity risk, its sources, measures, and the principles of liquidity risk management, as well as scenarios for stress...

The design and development of post-retirement income products require the assessment of longevity risk, as well as a basis for hedging these risks. Most indices for longevity risk are age-period based. We develop and assess a cohort-based value index for life insurers and pension funds to manage...

We derive a simple expression for the sensitivity of duration, convexity, and higher-order bond risk measures to changes in term structure shape parameters. Our analysis enables fixed income portfolio managers to capture the combined effects of term structure level, slope, and curvature shifts...

We study the exposure of mortgage borrowers in Switzerland to interest rate, income and house price risks and examine how the households' choice of risky mortgages is related to individual interest rate expectations and risk-aversion. Our analysis is based on a unique data set of household...

This paper proposes a framework to check for consistency between the IMF's standard country surveillance tool, namely medium-term projections of the macroeconomic framework (including the real, fiscal, external, and monetary sectors), and the financial sector. Consistency here entails that the...

Based on German government bond yields, this paper analyses the performance of laddered strategies during a period of low interest rates. Relying on the REX, Germany"s leading bond index, laddered cash flows are created, and maturity structures are systematically changed. A constructed rolling...

The confluence of three trends in the U.S. residential housing market - rising home prices, declining interest rates, and near-frictionless refinancing opportunities - led to vastly increased systemic risk in the financial system. Individually, each of these trends is benign, but when they occur...

Banks' leverage choices represent a delicate balancing act. Credit discipline argues for more leverage, while balance-sheet opacity and ease of asset substitution argue for less. Meanwhile, regulatory safety nets promote ex post financial stability, but also create perverse incentives for banks...

This paper identifies bank-specific-characteristics and market conditions that contribute to determine prices and demand for liquidity in the interbank market as wells as banks' access to this market. Results indicate that riskier banks pay higher prices and borrow less liquidity, concurrent...