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Articles 1 - 17 of 17
Full-Text Articles in Policy Design, Analysis, and Evaluation
United States: National Bank Holiday, 1933, Ayodeji George
United States: National Bank Holiday, 1933, Ayodeji George
Journal of Financial Crises
By mid-February 1933, the United States was in the depths of the Great Depression and the banking system faced sustained depositor runs and currency hoarding. On February 14, the governor of Michigan declared a holiday for all banks and trusts in the state. There followed a wave of declared bank holidays and bank runs across the country. The public withdrew $1.8 billion in gold and currency from banks in February and early March, with nearly two-thirds of those withdrawals occurring in the week ended Friday, March 3. By that date, 25 of 48 states had implemented bank holidays or restricted …
United States: Lehman Brothers Broker-Dealer Emergency Liquidity Program, 2008, Ayodeji George, Steven Kelly
United States: Lehman Brothers Broker-Dealer Emergency Liquidity Program, 2008, Ayodeji George, Steven Kelly
Journal of Financial Crises
On Sunday, September 14, 2008, a deal to sell the United States investment bank Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. (LBHI) to United Kingdom–based Barclays fell apart. US authorities informed LBHI that, given the lack of rescue funds, it would need to file for bankruptcy before Monday morning to avoid additional chaos for the firm and markets. However, authorities understood Barclays was still interested in buying Lehman’s broker-dealer subsidiary, Lehman Brothers Inc. (LBI). Federal Reserve and Treasury officials were concerned about the impact that the sudden failure of LBI could have on financial markets. LBI had $87 billion in secured overnight repurchase …
United States: Bear Stearns Emergency Liquidity Assistance, 2008, Vincient Arnold
United States: Bear Stearns Emergency Liquidity Assistance, 2008, Vincient Arnold
Journal of Financial Crises
On Thursday, March 13, 2008, the US investment bank Bear Stearns Companies approached the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRBNY), saying it expected many of its repurchase agreement (repo) counterparties would not “roll,” or renew, their repo agreements the next day. As a result, the firm would be obligated to repay many of its repo liabilities. Without an emergency loan, Bear would be forced to file for bankruptcy on Friday morning, March 14. Before the market opened on Friday, the FRBNY made an overnight loan for $12.9 billion through JPMorgan Chase Bank (JPMC) on a nonrecourse basis, which on-lent …
United States: Bank Of America Emergency Liquidity Program, 2009, Vincient Arnold
United States: Bank Of America Emergency Liquidity Program, 2009, Vincient Arnold
Journal of Financial Crises
On December 31, 2008, Bank of America (BofA) finalized its acquisition of Merrill Lynch, absorbing losses of $15.5 billion as a result. Regulators were concerned about BofA’s short-term liquidity position and ability to post more collateral if its credit rating was downgraded. On January 16, 2009, the Federal Reserve, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), and Department of the Treasury announced an interagency support package to BofA, which included an asset guarantee wherein all three agencies shared losses with BofA on a “ring-fenced” $118 billion pool of assets. Under the ring-fencing arrangement, known as the Asset Guarantee Program (AGP), BofA would …
Policy Note | Weekly Fed Report Still Drives Discount Window Stigma, Steven Kelly
Policy Note | Weekly Fed Report Still Drives Discount Window Stigma, Steven Kelly
Journal of Financial Crises
As banking regulators work to destigmatize the Federal Reserve’s discount window—and fervently so since the 2023 banking crisis—they’ve pointed to several potentially fruitful policy routes. These have included supervisory improvements, regulatory changes, and operational enhancements by both the banks and the Fed. Left off the menu so far have been changes to the Fed’s weekly publications that reveal up-to-date discount window borrowing data by regional geography. Reforms following the Global Financial Crisis of 2007–2009 have made mandatory the disclosure of discount window borrowers on a two-year lag—higher transparency than previously when no disclosure was required. However, bigger banks, such as …
Fhlb Dividends: Low-Hanging Fruit For Reconfiguring Fhlb Lending, Steven Kelly, Susan Mclaughlin, Andrew Metrick
Fhlb Dividends: Low-Hanging Fruit For Reconfiguring Fhlb Lending, Steven Kelly, Susan Mclaughlin, Andrew Metrick
Journal of Financial Crises
In the United States, the lender-of-last-resort tool is the Federal Reserve’s discount window. Despite countervailing policy efforts, substantial market stigma remains associated with borrowing from the discount window. It is in this context that market participants have come to view the Federal Home Loan Banks (FHLBs) as an alternative to the Fed’s discount window for backstop liquidity needs—despite the FHLBs’ relatively constrained abilities to play this role. Notably, however, the FHLBs don’t just benefit from discount window stigma; the FHLBs reinforce discount window stigma with their subsidized pricing. The FHLBs are government-sponsored enterprises—and as such can fund themselves at government …
United States: Main Street Lending Program, Steven Kelly
United States: Main Street Lending Program, Steven Kelly
Journal of Financial Crises
In March 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic caused slowdowns and disruptions to economic activity, businesses faced disruptions to their revenues and experienced increased demand for credit. Yet, as the pandemic worsened the economic outlook, banks tightened credit. Starting on March 17, the Federal Reserve rolled out several emergency programs aimed at capital markets. Most of these programs tended to benefit relatively large companies. On March 23, the Fed said it would introduce a program targeting small and mid-sized companies. On April 9, 2020, the Federal Reserve announced its first design iteration of the novel Main Street Lending Program (MSLP). The …
Lessons Learned: Scott G. Alvarez, Esq., Part 2, Steven Kelly
Lessons Learned: Scott G. Alvarez, Esq., Part 2, Steven Kelly
Journal of Financial Crises
Scott G. Alvarez was general counsel of the Federal Reserve Board during the Global Financial Crisis (GFC). He met with the Yale Program on Financial Stability (YPFS) to discuss a litany of legal aspects related to the Fed’s interventions under its emergency liquidity provision authority under Section 13(3) of the Federal Reserve Act. We summarize some highlights from our interview with Mr. Alvarez. The transcript of this interview, conducted in April 2022, and one from an earlier Lessons Learned interview, in December 2018
United States: Paycheck Protection Program Liquidity Facility, Steven Kelly
United States: Paycheck Protection Program Liquidity Facility, Steven Kelly
Journal of Financial Crises
In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, the US Congress passed and funded the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) to help small businesses facing business disruptions keep workers on their payrolls and meet other expenses. The PPP, signed into law on March 27, 2020, provided a mechanism for authorized lenders to extend concessionary, forgivable loans guaranteed by the Small Business Administration (SBA). Lenders ultimately extended approximately $800 billion in PPP loans. The SBA distributed the funds when the loan either defaulted or met the law's terms for SBA forgiveness. To buttress lenders' ability to fund PPP loans, the Federal Reserve …
United States: Municipal Liquidity Facility, Steven Kelly
United States: Municipal Liquidity Facility, Steven Kelly
Journal of Financial Crises
In March 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic caused severe financial stress for state and local municipalities. Municipalities' public health responses led to material increases in expenditures. At the same time, many municipalities faced revenue delays and declines due to extended tax deadlines and disruptions in taxable economic activity. Institutional investors also put heavy selling pressure on municipal bonds. In response to stresses in the municipal financing market, the Federal Reserve invoked its Section 13(3) emergency lending authority and created the Municipal Liquidity Facility (MLF). The Fed created the facility to backstop municipal entities' access to capital markets to help them manage …
United States: Primary Market Corporate Credit Facility And Secondary Market Corporate Credit Facility, Natalie Leonard
United States: Primary Market Corporate Credit Facility And Secondary Market Corporate Credit Facility, Natalie Leonard
Journal of Financial Crises
The COVID-19 pandemic reached a critical stage in early 2020 causing severe distress and disruption in financial markets, and the United States government declared a federal state of emergency in the second week of March. As institutional investors including mutual funds, pension funds, and insurance companies withdrew from corporate bond markets and funding options for large US businesses dried up, the Federal Reserve became concerned that solvent businesses might have difficulty financing their operations. On March 23, the Federal Reserve Board invoked Section 13(3) of the Federal Reserve Act, creating two novel emergency lending facilities to support the corporate bond …
United States: Term Auction Facility, Corey N. Runkel, Anshu Chen
United States: Term Auction Facility, Corey N. Runkel, Anshu Chen
Journal of Financial Crises
Following the announcement on August 9, 2007, by BNP Paribas that it was suspending redemptions for three of its open-end investment funds that had invested heavily in mortgage-backed securities, liquidity in the American interbank and short-term funding markets tightened considerably. On August 17, the Federal Reserve lowered the cost of borrowing from the discount window. However, usage remained low, due largely to the perception that such borrowing implied weak financials. In December, the Fed launched the Term Auction Facility (TAF), which used single-rate auctions to mitigate this stigma. The TAF offered discount-window credit of 28 days, and later, 84 days. …
Lessons Learned: Lorie Logan, Mercedes Cardona
Lessons Learned: Lorie Logan, Mercedes Cardona
Journal of Financial Crises
Lorie Logan is executive vice president in the Markets Group of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, the System Open Market Account (SOMA) manager pro tem for the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), and head of Market Operations, Monitoring, and Analysis (MOMA).
1970 Commercial Paper Market Liquidity Crisis (U.S. Historical), Kaleb B. Nygaard
1970 Commercial Paper Market Liquidity Crisis (U.S. Historical), Kaleb B. Nygaard
Journal of Financial Crises
Penn Central Transportation Company (Penn Central), the resulting railroad company of the late 1960s merger of Pennsylvania Railroad and New York Central Railroad, filed for bankruptcy on June 21, 1970. The bankruptcy came in the middle of the 1969–70 recession and sparked a sharp downturn in the commercial paper market. The Federal Reserve did not intervene directly in the commercial paper market but rather increased funding options available to banks via the discount window and an amendment to Regulation Q. The banks then provided funds to corporations unable to acquire them from the commercial paper market. The liquidity crisis abated …
The Federal Reserve’S Financial Crisis Response D: Commercial Paper Market Facilities, Rosalind Z. Wiggins, Andrew Metrick
The Federal Reserve’S Financial Crisis Response D: Commercial Paper Market Facilities, Rosalind Z. Wiggins, Andrew Metrick
Journal of Financial Crises
During the summer of 2007, the U.S. residential mortgage market began to decline sharply negatively impacting the asset-backed commercial paper (ABCP) market, which often relied on mortgages as underlying support. Money Market Mutual Funds (MMMFs), significant investors in commercial paper (CP), quickly retreated from the market, causing a substantial decline in outstanding ABCP. In September 2008, pressures on the markets severely escalated again, when the Reserve Primary Fund MMMF “broke the buck” and prompted run-like redemption requests by many MMMF investors. These disruptions resulted in higher rates and shorter maturities, practically freezing the market for term CP. Concerned about the …
Guarantees And Capital Infusions In Response To Financial Crises C: U.S. 2009 Stress Test, Chase P. Ross, June Rhee, Andrew Metrick
Guarantees And Capital Infusions In Response To Financial Crises C: U.S. 2009 Stress Test, Chase P. Ross, June Rhee, Andrew Metrick
Journal of Financial Crises
When President Obama took office in 2009, the Treasury focused on restarting bank lending and repairing the ability of the banking system as a whole to perform the role of credit intermediation. In order to do so, the Treasury needed to raise public confidence that banks had sufficient buffers to withstand even a very adverse economic scenario, especially given heightened uncertainty surrounding the outlook of the U.S. economy and potential losses in the banking system. The Supervisory Capital Assessment Program (SCAP)—the so-called “stress tests”—sought to rigorously measure the resilience of the largest bank holding companies. Those found to have insufficient …
Guarantees And Capital Infusions In Response To Financial Crises B: U.S. Guarantees During The Global Financial Crisis, June Rhee, Andrew Metrick
Guarantees And Capital Infusions In Response To Financial Crises B: U.S. Guarantees During The Global Financial Crisis, June Rhee, Andrew Metrick
Journal of Financial Crises
During 2008-09, the federal government extended multiple guarantee programs in an effort to restore the financial market and contain the panic and crisis in the market. For example, the Treasury provided a temporary guarantee program for the money market funds, the FDIC decided to stand behind certain debts and non-interest-bearing transaction accounts, and the Treasury, the FDIC, and the Federal Reserve agreed to share losses in certain assets belonging to Citigroup. This case reviews these guarantee programs implemented during the global financial crisis by the government and explores the different rationale that shaped certain design features of each program.