We introduce a novel database on sovereign defaults that involve public debt instruments governed by domestic law. By systematically reviewing a large number of sources, we identify 134 default and restructuring events of domestic debt instruments, in 52 countries from 1980 to 2018. Domestic-law...

We investigate the volatility dynamics of some major European Monetary Union sovereign bond markets. We provide an endogenous characterization in terms of two Markov switching regimes for market volatility and analyze the impact of some institutional sector imbalances and policy actions on the...

We analyze holdings of public bonds by over 20,000 banks in 191 countries, and the role of these bonds in 20 sovereign defaults over 1998-2012. Banks hold many public bonds (on average 9% of their assets), particularly in less financially-developed countries. During sovereign defaults, banks...

The COVID-19 pandemic provides a unique setting in which to evaluate the importance of a country's fiscal capacity in explaining the relation between economic growth shocks and sovereign default risk. For a sample of 30 developed countries, we find a positive and significant sensitivity of...

With a view to establishing a Capital Markets Union (CMU), efforts to integrate (private) capital markets and private risk-sharing in the European Union are underway. However, the single (capital) market will be burdened by a perennial potential threat to sovereign bond market stability in the...

Expectations of risky bond payments are unobservable and recovery rates for sovereigns are hard to estimate because they have no contractual claims to defined assets and samples of defaults are limited. A geometric version of credit spread is used to derive expected payments, dependent on...

This study explores the drivers of secondary market yields of Sub-Saharan African (SSA) sovereign Eurobonds from 2008 to mid-2017. Our results indicate that, beyond global 'push' factors, country-specific 'pull' factors such as inflation and GDP growth matter too for SSA Eurobond performance. A...

Unnoticed in the literature on sovereign bonds, an innovation has been taking place over the past decade and a half. Starting with a single issuance in 2006 by Mexico and two issuances by Brazil in 2007, a small number of issuers have been using what are known as "doomsday" or "make whole" call...

This paper studies how the currency composition of public debt affects debt sustainability in developing countries. We show empirically that the debt-to-GDP ratio tends to grow at a faster rate when countries with a high share of foreign currency debt face a currency depreciation. The paper also...

Countries with large debts stocks are vulnerable to the vagaries of the markets. Confidence crises can arise out of nowhere, constricting access to the markets. Hence, the question arises as to whether these countries should put in place mechanisms that will help them better prepare for the...