We examine price pressure in a setting where trades occur because of regulations and when information effects are absent. Our study of fallen angel bond sales by insurance companies shows that price pressure is negligible, if not non-existent. We attribute our results to the fact that the trades...

Empirical tests of reduced form models of default attribute a large fraction of observed credit spreads to compensation for jump-to-default risk. However, these models preclude a “contagion-risk” channel, where the aggregate corporate bond index reacts adversely to a credit event. In this...

The Lehman bankruptcy highlights the potential for interconnectedness among financial firms to cause a financial crisis. Previous research shows that Chapter 11 filings cause significant negative externalities, consistent with a strong role for counterparty contagion. However, the effects may...

The Lehman bankruptcy highlights the potential for interconnectedness to cause negative externalities through counterparty contagion, but the externalities may also arise from information contagion. We examine contagion from troubled financial firms and find that counterparty contagion is...

We investigate two competing explanations for commercial bank distress during financial crises: liquidity shortages and solvency concerns. If liquidity shortages cause distress, a lender of last resort can help by providing funds to banks having trouble rolling over short-term debt and facing...

We investigate liquidity shocks and shocks to fundamentals during financial crises at commercial banks, investment banks, and hedge funds. Liquidity shock amplification models assume that widespread funding problems cause fire sales. We find that most banks do not experience funding declines...

As a result of the current financial crisis, there have been many calls for strict new regulation of over-the-counter financial derivatives. This paper proposes, instead, that we return to the now-voided common law on derivatives and consider them non-legally enforceable gambling contracts...

Policymakers justify bailing out major financial firms by saying those firms are 'too big to fail.' They argue that such failure would subject the market to 'counterparty contagion' as the failed firms default on their obligations to other firms. But empirical evidence indicates that...

What explains the wide swings in the default rate on high yield bonds in recent years? Differences in credit quality from year to year account for much of the observed variation in default rates, but economic conditions and the age of bonds have also played a role

This paper examines underpricing of IPOs and seasoned offerings in the corporate bond market. We investigate whether underpricing represents a solution to an information problem or a liquidity problem. We find that underpricing occurs with both IPOs and seasoned offering and is highest among...