Economics Commons^™

Hungary: National Deposit Insurance Fund, Zijin (Phoebe) Lei, Ezekiel Vergara

Journal of Financial Crises

At the height of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC), Hungary announced changes to its deposit-insurance system on October 8, 2008. The government said that it would increase the deposit-insurance cap from HUF 6 million to HUF 13 million (about USD 31,000 to about USD 68,000), the equivalent of roughly EUR 50,000 (about USD 68,000), in line with a European Union (EU) recommendation. Hungary’s finance minister also announced that the state would temporarily provide an unlimited deposit guarantee, following the actions of several European countries. The unlimited guarantee was political, meaning it was not implemented through official legislation. It was effective …

Iceland: Depositors’ And Investors’ Guarantee Fund, Adam Kulam

Journal of Financial Crises

Leading up to the Global Financial Crisis of 2007–2009, Iceland’s three largest banks accumulated assets totaling several times the size of Iceland’s GDP and financed their growth through foreign borrowing. As wholesale funding dried up in 2007, they replaced this borrowing by rapidly gathering deposits through foreign branches and subsidiaries located in the European Union, primarily in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. In the summer and fall of 2008, international credit markets froze and the Icelandic banks were unable to roll over their maturing liabilities. On October 6, Prime Minister Geir Haarde announced a full guarantee of domestic deposits. …

Greece: Hellenic Deposit Guarantee Fund, Lily S. Engbith

Journal of Financial Crises

Responding to general financial and economic volatility during the Global Financial Crisis (GFC), the Greek government in November 2008 sought to shore up public confidence in the banking system by raising the deposit-insurance limit from EUR 20,000 to EUR 100,000 (127,000 USD) per depositor for three years. The Hellenic Deposit Guarantee Fund (HDGF) was responsible for administering this adjustment, which was accompanied by a fivefold increase in the percentages used for calculating member institutions’ annual contributions. All credit institutions that were authorized to operate in Greece, including branches of foreign banks without their own coverage, were required to participate in …

Hong Kong Sar: Full Deposit Guarantee, Ezekiel Vergara, Lily S. Engbith

Journal of Financial Crises

Following a run on Hong Kong’s fifth-biggest bank in September 2008, the Hong Kong government announced that it would use its Exchange Fund to extend full insurance temporarily to depositors at approved banks. The existing Deposit Protection Scheme (DPS) would continue to insure the first 100,000 Hong Kong dollars (HKD; about USD 13,000) per depositor at each bank; the new program would cover the rest. It also covered a broader set of institutions. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) administered the program, overseen by the Hong Kong Deposit Protection Board (HKDPB); the HKMA was also responsible for managing the Exchange …

France: Deposit Guarantee Fund, Ezekiel Vergara

Journal of Financial Crises

In October 2008, during the Global Financial Crisis (GFC), European Union (EU) officials urged member states to raise their minimum deposit-insurance coverage to at least EUR 50,000 (USD 68,000) to promote confidence in banks. France did not need to increase its deposit-insurance cap to meet this target, as it already guaranteed EUR 70,000. The following year, EU officials passed a directive that required all member states to permanently increase their minimum deposit-insurance coverage to EUR 100,000 by December 31, 2010. French authorities complied with the EU’s directive on September 29, 2010. The Fonds de Garantie des Dépôts (FGD), a private …

Brazil: Time Deposits With Special Guarantee, Sharon M. Nunn

Journal of Financial Crises

Uncertainty from the Global Financial Crisis spread to the Brazilian financial system in 2008, triggering a flight to quality toward assets with explicit or implicit government guarantees. In the Brazilian context, this meant depositors pulled funds from small and medium-size banks and parked them in larger banks that investors believed the government was more likely to backstop. The National Monetary Council (CMN) created the Time Deposits with Special Guarantee program (DPGE) in March 2009 to bolster liquidity in small and medium-size banks. The CMN put the country’s existing deposit insurer, the Credit Guarantee Fund (FGC), in charge of administering the …

Belgium: Protection Fund/Special Protection Fund, Adam Kulam

Journal of Financial Crises

At the height of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) in fall 2008, the Belgian government increased the coverage limits of its deposit guarantee to restore faith in its banking system, protect savers and depositors, and safeguard financial stability. Belgium joined the European Union’s (EU) efforts to strengthen deposit guarantee systems. The measures complemented the Belgian government’s other efforts to secure domestic banks. The government implemented the emergency measures in October and November 2008 through royal decrees, which Parliament later incorporated into law. In a five-week span, Belgian authorities increased the deposit guarantee from EUR 20,000 to EUR 100,000 (USD 26,820 …

Austria: Unlimited Deposit Guarantee, Sharon M. Nunn

Journal of Financial Crises

After Germany and Ireland implemented unlimited deposit guarantees, Austrian officials passed a law on October 26, 2008, that removed deposit-insurance limits for individual depositors, fearing that Austrians would move their money to countries with higher deposit coverage. The government established the program using the country’s existing, mandatory deposit-insurance system (DIS), which was private, ex post funded, and segmented into sectoral schemes that covered different kinds of financial institutions. During payouts, the schemes covered the first EUR 50,000 (USD 67,000) of guaranteed funds to a given depositor, and the government the government covered the rest. The government required all financial institutions …

Broad-Based Emergency Liquidity Programs, Rosalind Z. Wiggins, Sean Fulmer, Greg Feldberg, Andrew Metrick

Journal of Financial Crises

In this paper, we analyze broad-based emergency liquidity (BBEL) programs. Our main purpose is to assist policymakers who are considering establishing a BBEL program in designing the most effective program possible as efficiently as possible. Our insights are derived from 33 case studies the Yale Program on Financial Stability produced and existing literature on the topic.

Liquidity provision is a long-established mandate of central banks and was a function that private entities performed even before the establishment of central banks. We survey a sampling of cases from the 19th through 21st centuries, drawn from 10 countries and regions, to distill …

Australia: Financial Claims Scheme, Ezekiel Vergara

Journal of Financial Crises

Following the collapse of Lehman Brothers on September 15, 2008, the Australian government intervened in its own banking system, both to support domestic depositors and to keep its banking system competitive with those in countries whose regulators had already intervened. On October 12, 2008, the Australian government announced the Financial Claims Scheme (FCS) to insure bank depositors. The deposit guarantee automatically insured depositors at all authorized deposit-taking institutions and covered a range of deposit accounts. As initially announced, the FCS would provide a blanket guarantee to all depositors with no fee for participation. This blanket guarantee, however, prompted a migration …

Market Support Programs: Covid-19 Crisis, June Rhee, Lily S. Engbith, Greg Feldberg, Andrew Metrick

Journal of Financial Crises

This paper is an analysis of important considerations for policymakers seeking to establish a market support program (MSP). Our main purpose is to assist policymakers who have already made the decision to use an MSP in designing the most effective program possible. Our insights derive from 23 case studies the Yale Program on Financial Stability produced and existing literature on the topic.

By the onset of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC), market-based finance and traditional banking systems were significantly intertwined, and the panic in market-based finance threatened to spread quickly to both traditional banks and the real economy. In response, …

Account Guarantee Survey, Christian M. Mcnamara, Adam Kulam, Greg Feldberg, Andrew Metrick

Journal of Financial Crises

This paper surveys 27 account guarantee (AG) programs across 14 Key Design Decisions. The main themes that emerge are: (a) the importance of considering the effects of AG programs on other parts of the financial system or other jurisdictions, (b) the ability to address moral hazard through heightened supervision, which removes a potential obstacle to adopting AG programs in response to the acute phase of crises, (c) the necessity of developing guarantees that are credible and timely, and (d) the need to design standing AG programs with an eye toward how they will function during crises.

Dividends And Bank Capital In The Global Financial Crisis Of 2007–2009, Viral V. Acharya, Irvind Gujral, Nirupama Kulkarni, Hyun Song Shin

Journal of Financial Crises

The headline numbers appear to show that even as banks and financial intermediaries suffered large credit losses in the Global Financial Crisis of 2007–2009, they raised substantial amounts of new capital, both from private investors and from government-funded capital injections. However, on closer inspection, the composition of bank capital shifted radically from one based on common equity to that based on debt-like hybrid claims such as preferred equity and subordinated debt. The erosion of common equity was exacerbated by large-scale payments of dividends, in spite of widely anticipated credit losses. Dividend payments represent a transfer from creditors (and potentially taxpayers) …

Trade, Leakage, And The Design Of A Carbon Tax, David A. Weisbach, Samuel Kortum, Michael Wang, Yujia Yao

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

Climate policies vary widely across countries, with some countries imposing stringent emissions policies and others doing very little. When climate policies vary across countries, energy-intensive industries have an incentive to relocate to places with few or no emissions restrictions, an effect known as leakage. Relocated industries would continue to pollute but would be operating in a less desirable location. We consider solutions to the leakage problem in a simple setting where one region of the world imposes a climate policy and the rest of the world is passive. We solve the model analytically and also calibrate and simulate the model. …

Informational Intermediation, Market Feedback, And Welfare Losses, Kai Hao Yang, Wenji Xu

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

This paper examines the welfare implications of third-party informational intermediation. A seller sets the price of a product that is sold through an informational intermediary. The intermediary can disclose information about the product to consumers and earns a fixed percentage of sales revenue in each period. The intermediary’s market base grows at a rate that increases with past consumer surplus. We characterize the stationary equilibria and the set of subgame perfect equilibrium payoffs. When market feedback (i.e., the extent to which past consumer surplus affects future market bases) increases, welfare may decrease in the Pareto sense.

Why Have Interest Rates Been Low?, Ray C. Fair

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

This paper uses an estimated interest rate rule of the Fed to argue that the low recent interest rates may be due to a change in Fed behavior. Prior to the Great Recession the Fed’s behavior is consistent with the rule. During the recession the zero lower bound was hit in 2008.4. The rule unconstrained called for negative nominal interest rates during this period, and so it became inoperative. The Fed kept the interest rate at roughly zero through 2015. This was a period of low inflation and still fairly high unemployment rates, and the rule called for essentially zero …

A General Limit Theory For Nonlinear Functionals Of Nonstationary Time Series, Qiying Wang, Peter C. B. Phillips

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

Limit theory is provided for a wide class of covariance functionals of
a nonstationary process and stationary time series. The results are relevant
to estimation and inference in nonlinear nonstationary regressions that involve unit root, local unit root or fractional processes and they include both parametric and nonparametric regressions. Self normalized versions of these
statistics are considered that are useful in inference. Numerical evidence reveals a strong bimodality in the finite sample distributions that persists for very large sample sizes although the limit theory is Gaussian. New self normalized versions are introduced that deliver improved approximations.

Screening With Persuasion, Dirk Bergemann, Tibor Heumann, Stephen Morris

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

We consider a general nonlinear pricing environment with private information. The seller can control both the signal that the buyers receive about their value and the selling mechanism. We characterize the optimal menu and information structure that jointly maximize the seller's profit. The optimal screening mechanism has finitely many items even with a continuum of values. We identify sufficient conditions under which the optimal mechanism has a single item. Thus the seller decreases the variety of items below the efficient level in order to reduce the information rents of the buyers.

Weak Identification Of Long Memory With Implications For Inference, Peter C. B. Phillips

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

This paper explores weak identification issues arising in commonly used models of
economic and financial time series. Two highly popular configurations are shown to
be asymptotically observationally equivalent: one with long memory and weak autoregressive dynamics, the other with antipersistent shocks and a near-unit autoregressive
root. We develop a data-driven semiparametric and identification-robust approach to
inference that reveals such ambiguities and documents the prevalence of weak identification in many realized volatility and trading volume series. The identification-robust empirical evidence generally favors long memory dynamics in volatility and volume, a conclusion that is corroborated using social-media news flow data.

Prudential Policy With Distorted Beliefs, Eduardo Dávila, Ansgar Walther

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

This paper studies leverage regulation when equity investors and/or creditors have distorted beliefs relative to a planner. We characterize how the optimal regulation responds to arbitrary changes in investors’/creditors’ beliefs, relating our results to practical scenarios. We show that the optimal regulation depends on the type and magnitude of such changes. Optimism by investors calls for looser leverage regulation, while optimism by creditors, or jointly by both investors/creditors, calls for tighter leverage regulation. Our results apply to environments with i) planners with imperfect knowledge of investors’/creditors’ beliefs, ii) monetary policy, iii) bailouts and pecuniary externalities, and iv) endogenous beliefs.

Lookalike Targeting On Others' Journeys: Brand Versus Performance Marketing, K. Sudhir, Seung Yoon Lee, Subroto Roy

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

Lookalike targeting is a widely used model-based ad targeting approach that uses a seed database of individuals to identify matching “lookalikes” for targeted customer acquisition. An advertiser has to make two key choices: (1) who to seed on and (2) seed-match rank range. First, we find that seeding on others’ journey stage can be effective in new customer acquisition; despite the cold start nature of customer acquisition using Lookalike audiences, third parties can indeed identify factors unobserved to the advertiser that move individuals along the journey and can be correlated with the lookalikes. Further, while journey-based seeding adds no incremental …

Econometric Analysis Of Asset Price Bubbles, Shuping Shi, Peter C. B. Phillips

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

In the presence of bubbles, asset prices consist of a fundamental and a bubble component, with the bubble component following an explosive dynamic. The general idea for bubble identification is to apply explosive root tests to a proxy of the unobservable bubble. Three notable proxies are the real asset prices, log price-payoff ratios, and estimated non-fundamental components. The rationale for all three proxy choices rests on the definition of bubbles, which has been presented in various forms in the literature. This chapter provides a theoretical framework that incorporates several definitions of bubbles (and fundamentals) and offers guidance for selecting proxies. …

Selection In The Presence Of Implicit Bias: The Advantage Of Intersectional Constraints, Anay Mehrota, Bary S.R. Pradelski, Nisheeth Vishnoi

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

In selection processes such as hiring, promotion, and college admissions, implicit bias toward socially-salient attributes such as race, gender, or sexual orientation produces persistent inequality and reduces utility for the decision-maker. Recent works show that interventions like the Rooney Rule, which require a minimum quota of individuals from each affected group, are very effective in improving utility when individuals belong to at most one affected group. However, in several settings, individuals belong to multiple affected groups and, consequently, face more extreme implicit bias due to this intersectionality. We consider independently drawn utilities and show that, with intersectionality, the aforementioned non-intersectional …

The Impact Of Upzoning On Housing Construction In Auckland, Ryan Greenaway-Mcgrevy, Peter C. B. Phillips

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

There is a growing debate about whether upzoning is an effective policy response to housing shortages and unaffordable housing. This paper provides empirical evidence to further inform debate by examining the various impacts of recently implemented zoning reforms on housing construction in Auckland, the largest metropolitan area in New Zealand. In 2016, the city upzoned approximately three quarters of its inner suburban land to facilitate construction of more intensive housing. We use a quasi-experimental approach to analyze the short-run impacts of the reform on construction, allowing for potential shifts in construction from non-upzoned to upzoned areas (negative spillovers) that would, …

Asymptotics Of Polynomial Time Trend Estimation And Hypothesis Testing Under Rank Deficiency, Peter C. B. Phillips

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

Limit theory is developed for least squares regression estimation of a model involving time trend polynomials and a moving average error process with a unit root. Models with these features can arise from data manipulation such as overdifferencing and model features such as the presence of multicointegration. The impact of such features on the asymptotic equivalence of least squares and generalized least squares is considered. Problems of rank deficiency that are induced asymptotically by the presence of time polynomials in the regression are also studied, focusing on the impact that singularities have on hypothesis testing using Wald statistics and matrix …

Personalized Pricing And Competition, Andrew Rhodes, Jidong Zhou

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

We study personalized pricing (or first-degree price discrimination) in a general oligopoly model. In the short-run, when the market structure is fixed, the impact of personalized pricing hinges on the degree of market coverage (i.e., how many consumers buy). If coverage is high (e.g., because the production cost is low, or the number of firms is large), personalized pricing intensifies competition and so harms firms but benefits consumers, whereas the opposite is true if coverage is low. However in the long-run, when the market structure is endogenous, personalized pricing always benefits consumers because it induces the socially optimal level of …

Personalized Pricing And Competition, Andrew Rhodes, Jidong Zhou

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

We study personalized pricing in a general oligopoly model. When the market structure is fixed, the impact of personalized pricing relative to uniform pricing hinges on the degree of market coverage. If market conditions are such that coverage is high, personalized pricing harms firms and benefits consumers, whereas the opposite is true if coverage is low. However, when the market structure is endogenous, personalized pricing benefits consumers because it induces socially optimal firm entry. Finally, when only some firms have data to personalize prices, consumers can be worse off compared to when either all or no firms personalize prices.

Lessons Learned: Steven Rattner, Mary Anne Chute Lynch

Journal of Financial Crises

Steven Rattner, an investment banker and private equity professional, joined the Obama administration as counselor to the Secretary of the Treasury and head of the Obama administration’s Task Force on the Auto Industry, which was charged with providing aid to Chrysler and General Motors, and later to other entities, to avoid their disorderly failure and the loss of a million or more jobs. The Auto Task Force worked intensely throughout 2009 to swiftly negotiate with the corporate leadership, unions, investors, and other stakeholders of the two manufacturers to design an orderly restructuring that would put the companies on a path …

Lessons Learned: Harry Wilson, Mary Anne Chute Lynch

Journal of Financial Crises

Harry Wilson was one of four senior advisers to the US Department of the Treasury during the Obama administration and served on the President’s Task Force on the Auto Industry, which was established in 2009 and charged with providing aid to General Motors and Chrysler, and later to other entities, to avoid their disorderly failure and the loss of a million or more jobs. The Auto Task Force worked intensively throughout 2009 to swiftly negotiate with the corporate leadership, unions, investors, and other stakeholders of the two manufacturers to design an orderly restructuring that would put the companies on a …

Lessons Learned: Mara Mcneill, Mary Anne Chute Lynch

Journal of Financial Crises

Mara McNeill was senior counsel to the US Department of the Treasury on the Obama administration’s Automotive Investment Financing Program (AIFP) during the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) of 2007–09. As senior counsel, McNeill was responsible for the department’s $80 billon financing of General Motors, Chrysler, Ally Financial, and Chrysler Financial. She worked with the Auto Team Task Force, the Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP) legal team, and the Department of Treasury. The bipartisan AIFP team was charged with overseeing the government’s efforts to assist the companies toward a “new lease on life,” while exercising strong financial principles to protect the …