After the 2008 financial crash governments and central banks had to rescue banks which had become insolvent or illiquid, and whose failure threatened the Western financial system. The bill for this taxpayer funded bailout came to over USD 20 trillion globally, including assistance from US, EU,...

The theme of this conference relates to causes and cures of debt crisis. The current international debt situation has led some analysts to suggest the possibility of a scenario whereby international debt defaults quickly lead to severe strains on domestic commercial banks. In this context,...

In this paper we survey the development of lending of last resort operations in the mid-19th century. We identify and document critical dimensions of the extension of lending of last resort functions, and also develop original empirical tests enabling us to identify such things as the emergence...

We use the founding of the Federal Reserve as a historical experiment to provide some insight into whether a lender of last resort can stabilize financial markets. Following the Panic of 1907, Congress passed two measures that established a lender of last resort in the United States: (1) the...