Through the lens of market participants' objective to minimize counterparty risk, we provide an explanation for the reluctance to clear derivative trades in the absence of a central clearing obligation. We develop a comprehensive understanding of the benefits and potential pitfalls with respect...

This article presents a generic model for pricing financial derivatives subject to counterparty credit risk. Both unilateral and bilateral types of credit risks are considered. Our study shows that credit risk should be modeled as American style options in most cases, which require a backward...

The one-side defaultable financial derivatives valuation problems have been studied extensively, but the valuation of bilateral derivatives with asymmetric credit qualities is still lacking convincing mechanism. This paper presents an analytical model for valuing derivatives subject to default...

This article presents a new model for valuing financial contracts subject to credit risk and collateralization. Examples include the valuation of a credit default swap (CDS) contract that is affected by the trilateral credit risk of the buyer, seller and reference entity. We show that default...

We document changes in borrowers' sensitivity to negative equity and show heightened borrower default propensity as a fundamental driver of crisis period mortgage defaults. Estimates of a time-varying coefficient competing risk hazard model reveal a marked run-up in the default option beta from...

This paper presents a new model for pricing OTC derivatives subject to collateralization. It allows for collateral posting adhering to bankruptcy laws. As such, the model can back out the market price of a collateralized contract. This framework is very useful for valuing outstanding...

Central clearing counterparties (CCPs) were established to mitigate default losses resulting from counterparty risk in derivatives markets. In a parsimonious model, we show that clearing benefits are distributed unevenly across market participants. Loss sharing rules determine who wins or loses...

We examine the effects of dealers’ inventories on the pricing and liquidity of OTC derivatives markets. Using position and pricing data on credit default swap (CDS) indices, we document that the change in index CDS spreads is negatively associated with the change in dealers’ net long...