We examine the portfolio choice of banks in a micro-funded model of runs. To insure riskaverse investors against liquidity risk, competitive banks offer demand deposits. We use global games to link the probability of a bank run to the portfolio choice. Based upon interim information about risky...

We examine insurance against loan default when lenders can screen in primary markets at a heterogeneous cost and learn loan quality over time. In equilibrium, low-cost lenders screen loans, but some high-cost lenders insure them. Insured loans are risk-free and liquid in a secondary market,...

We analyze how a wealth shift to emerging countries may lead to instability in developed countries. Investors exposed to expropriation risk are willing to pay a safety premium to invest in countries with good property rights. Domestic intermediaries compete for such cheap funding by carving out...

I study rollover risk in the wholesale funding market when intermediaries can hold liquidity ex ante and are subject to fire sales ex post. Precautionary liquidity restores multiple equilibria in a global rollover game. An intermediate liquidity level supports both the usual run equilibrium and...

We propose a parsimonious model of information choice in a global coordination game of regime change that is used to analyze debt crises, bank runs or currency attacks. A change in the publicly available information alters the uncertainty about the behavior of other investors. Greater strategic...

How does asset encumbrance affect the fragility of intermediaries subject to rollover risk? We offer a model in which a bank issues covered bonds backed by a pool of assets that is bankruptcy remote and replenished following losses. Encumbering assets allows a bank to raise cheap secured debt...

Can a wealth shift to emerging countries explain instability in developed countries? Investors exposed to political risk seek safety in countries with better property right protection. This induces private intermediaries to offer safety via inexpensive demandable debt, and increase lending into...

How does asset encumbrance affect the fragility of intermediaries subject to rollover risk? We offer a model in which a bank issues covered bonds backed by a pool of assets that is bankruptcy remote and replenished following losses. Encumbering assets allows a bank to raise cheap secured debt...

We model the asset-opacity choice of an intermediary subject to rollover risk in wholesale funding markets. Greater opacity means investors form more dispersed beliefs about an intermediary’s profitability. The endogenous benefit of opacity is lower fragility when profitability is expected to...