June 12, 2014 Stress Testing the Canadian Banking System: A System-Wide Approach Financial System Review - June 2014 Kartik Anand, Guillaume Bédard-Pagé, Virginie Traclet Stress testing is an important tool used by financial authorities and entities around the world to evaluate potential risks to the financial system. Kartik Anand, Guillaume Bédard-Pagé and Virginie Traclet discuss different stress-testing approaches, with emphasis on the innovative and analytically rigorous model developed by the Bank of Canada: the MacroFinancial Risk Assessment Framework (MFRAF). They also present the stress-test results obtained in the context of the 2013 Canada Financial Sector Assessment Program led by the International Monetary Fund, including the important contributions made by the use of MFRAF in the exercise. Content Type(s): Publications, Financial System Review articles Topic(s): Financial institutions, Financial stability JEL Code(s): C, C6, C63, G, G0, G01, G2, G21
June 12, 2014 Making Banks Safer: Implementing Basel III Financial System Review - June 2014 Éric Chouinard, Graydon Paulin Éric Chouinard and Graydon Paulin review the progress to date in implementing Basel III, the new framework of global regulatory standards for the banking sector developed by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision. The report highlights the expected net benefits of implementing Basel III, as well as the challenges in ensuring international consistency in measuring the risk-weighted capital of banks. It includes a discussion on how implementing Basel III has affected the banking system in Canada and other important jurisdictions, and demonstrates the need for ongoing assessment of the effects on the financial system and the macroeconomy. Content Type(s): Publications, Financial System Review articles Topic(s): Financial institutions, Financial system regulation and policies JEL Code(s): G, G2, G28
Rollover Risk, Liquidity and Macroprudential Regulation Staff Working Paper 2014-23 Toni Ahnert I study rollover risk in the wholesale funding market when intermediaries can hold liquidity ex ante and are subject to fire sales ex post. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Financial institutions, Financial system regulation and policies JEL Code(s): G, G0, G01, G1, G11, G2, G28
High-Frequency Trading Competition Staff Working Paper 2014-19 Jonathan Brogaard, Corey Garriott, Anna Pomeranets We analyze trading dynamics as successive high-frequency trading (HFT) firms begin to trade stocks in an equity market. Entrants compete with incumbents for volume, and there is crowding out. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Financial markets, Market structure and pricing JEL Code(s): G, G1, G14, G2, G20, L, L1
Uncertain Costs and Vertical Differentiation in an Insurance Duopoly Staff Working Paper 2014-14 Radoslav Raykov Classical oligopoly models predict that firms differentiate vertically as a way of softening price competition, but some metrics suggest very little quality differentiation in the U.S. auto insurance market. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Economic models, Market structure and pricing JEL Code(s): D, D4, D43, D8, D81, G, G2, G22, L, L2, L22
Do Sunspots Matter? Evidence from an Experimental Study of Bank Runs Staff Working Paper 2014-12 Jasmina Arifovic, Janet Hua Jiang A "sunspot" is a variable that has no direct impact on the economy’s fundamental condition, such as preferences, endowments or technologies, but may nonetheless affect economic outcomes through the expectations channel as a coordination device. This paper investigates how people react to sunspots in the context of a bank-run game in a controlled laboratory environment. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Financial markets, Financial stability JEL Code(s): C, C9, C91, C92, D, D8, D80, E, E5, E58, G, G2, G20
Rollover Risk and the Maturity Transformation Function of Banks Staff Working Paper 2014-8 Teodora Paligorova, João Santos This paper shows that banks that rely heavily on short-term funding engage less in maturity transformation in an attempt to decrease their exposure to rollover risk. These banks shorten both the maturity of their portfolio of loans as well as the maturity of newly issued loans. We find that the loan yield curve becomes steeper with banks’ increasing use of short-term funding. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Financial stability JEL Code(s): G, G2, G21
Banks’ Financial Distress, Lending Supply and Consumption Expenditure Staff Working Paper 2014-7 H. Evren Damar, Reint Gropp, Adi Mordel The paper employs a unique identification strategy that links survey data on household consumption expenditure to bank-level data in order to estimate the effects of bank financial distress on consumer credit and consumption expenditures. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Credit and credit aggregates, Domestic demand and components, Financial institutions JEL Code(s): E, E2, E21, E4, E44, G, G0, G01, G2, G21
Search-for-Yield in Canadian Fixed-Income Mutual Funds and Monetary Policy Staff Working Paper 2014-3 Sermin Gungor, Jesus Sierra This paper investigates the effects of monetary policy on the risk-taking behavior of fixed-income mutual funds in Canada. We consider different measures of the stance of monetary policy and investigate active variation in mutual funds’ risk exposure in response to monetary policy. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Financial institutions, Monetary policy transmission JEL Code(s): E, E5, E52, G, G2, G23
Household Risk Management and Actual Mortgage Choice in the Euro Area Staff Working Paper 2014-1 Michael Ehrmann, Michael Ziegelmeyer Mortgages constitute the largest part of household debt. An essential choice when taking out a mortgage is between fixed-interest-rate mortgages (FRMs) and adjustable-interest-rate mortgages (ARMs). However, so far, no comprehensive cross‐country study has analyzed what determines household demand for mortgage types, a task that this paper takes up using new data for the euro area. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Credit and credit aggregates, Monetary policy transmission JEL Code(s): D, D1, D12, E, E4, E43, E5, E52, G, G2, G21