Papers, wiki, Option Blackboard, encyclopedia, and cards.
This paper introduces a novel stochastic model for credit spreads. The stochastic approach leverages the diffusion of default intensities via a CIR++ model and is formulated within a risk-neutral probability space. Our research primarily addresses two gaps in the literature. The first is the lack of credit spread models founded on a stochastic basis that enables continuous modeling, as many existing models rely on fa…
ABSTRACT This article examines the optimal capital structure of a firm that can choose both the amount and maturity of its debt. Bankruptcy is determined endogenously rather than by the imposition of a positive net worth condition or by a cash flow constraint. The results extend Leland's (1994a) closed‐form results to a much richer class of possible debt structures and permit study of the optimal maturity of debt as …
Using micro-level data, we construct a credit spread index with considerable predictive power for future economic activity. We decompose the credit spread into a component that captures firm-specific information on expected defaults and a residual component–– the excess bond premium. Shocks to the excess bond premium that are orthogonal to the current state of the economy lead to declines in economic activity and ass…
ABSTRACT Using dealer's quotes and transactions prices on straight industrial bonds, we investigate the determinants of credit spread changes. Variables that should in theory determine credit spread changes have rather limited explanatory power. Further, the residuals from this regression are highly cross‐correlated, and principal components analysis implies they are mostly driven by a single common factor. Although …
ABSTRACT Most structural models of default preclude the firm from altering its capital structure. In practice, firms adjust outstanding debt levels in response to changes in firm value, thus generating mean‐reverting leverage ratios. We propose a structural model of default with stochastic interest rates that captures this mean reversion. Our model generates credit spreads that are larger for low‐leverage firms, and …
Persistent shifts in term-structure dynamics undermine the stability of single-regime models in long samples. We develop an arbitrage-free regime-switching generalized CIR (RS-GCIR) model that jointly prices the Chinese government bond (CGB) curve and corporate bond curves. To capture the systematic transmission from interest-rate conditions to credit spreads, we structure the model into two blocks and price corporat…
Abstract Two intermediary-based factors—a corporate bond dealer inventory measure and a broad intermediary distress measure—explain more than 40$\%$ of the puzzling common variation in credit spread changes beyond canonical structural factors. A simple intermediary-based model with partial market segmentation accounts for intermediary factors’ explanatory power and delivers three further implications with empirical s…
This paper extends an option-theoretic approach to estimate liquidity spreads for corporate bonds. Inspired by Longstaff's equity market framework and subsequent work by Koziol and Sauerbier on risk-free zero-coupon bonds, the model views liquidity as a look-back option. The model accounts for the interplay of risk-free rate volatility and credit risk. A numerical analysis highlights the impact of these factors on th…
The notion of a credit spread curve is fundamental in fixed income investing, but in practice it is not `given' and needs to be constructed from bond prices either for a particular issuer, or for a sector rating-by-rating. Rather than attempting to fit spreads -- and as we discuss here, the Z-spread is unsuitable -- we fit parametrised survival curves. By deriving a valuation formula for a risky bond, we explain and …
In this paper, we propose a methodology based on piece-wise homogeneous Markov chain for credit ratings and a multivariate model of the credit spreads to evaluate the financial risk in European Union (EU). Two main aspects are considered: how the financial risk is distributed among the European countries and how large is the value of the total risk. The first aspect is evaluated by means of the expected value of a dy…
Several studies have established the predictive power of the yield curve in terms of real economic activity. In this paper we use data for a variety of E.U. countries: both EMU (Germany, France, Italy) and non-EMU members (Sweden and the U.K.). The data used range from 1991:Q1 to 2009:Q1. For each country, we extract the long run trend and the cyclical component of real economic activity, while the corresponding inte…
Over the last decade, the foreign exchange derivatives market has witnessed a collapse of covered interest parity (CIP). Not only does this collapse give rise to large deviations from CIP, it has unlocked a stream of exploitable arbitrage opportunities across currencies. In this paper, we introduce two new factors – inflation differential and relative economic performance – as potential drivers of deviations from CIP…
In this paper, we consider a generic interest rate market in the presence of roll-over risk, which generates spreads in spot/forward term rates. We do not require classical absence of arbitrage and rely instead on a minimal market viability assumption, which enables us to work in the context of the benchmark approach. In a Markovian setting, we extend the control theoretic approach of Gombani & Runggaldier (2013) and…
Systemic liquidity risk, defined by the IMF as "the risk of simultaneous liquidity difficulties at multiple financial institutions", is a key topic in macroprudential policy and financial stress analysis. Specialized models to simulate funding liquidity risk and contagion are available but they require not only banks' bilateral exposures data but also balance sheet data with sufficient granularity, which are hardly a…
This paper compares different methods for forecasting the term structure of U.S. and European zero-coupon government bonds using both traditional econometric and Machine Learning (ML) approaches. We compare classical models (e.g., Dynamic Nelson-Siegel (DNS) and Principal Component Analysis (PCA)) with different Neural Network (NN) architectures, including those inspired by the classical models, on the U.S. Treasury …
We give a detailed account of correlations between credit sector/quality and treasury curve factors, using the robust framework of the Barclays POINT Global Risk Model. Consistent with earlier studies, we find a strong negative correlation between sector spreads and rate shifts. However, we also observe that the correlations between spreads and Treasury twists reversed recently, which is likely attributable to the Fe…
In this three-part series of papers, we argue that the conventional spread measures are not well defined for credit-risky bonds and introduce a set of credit term structures which correct for the biases associated with the strippable cash flow valuation assumption. We demonstrate that the resulting estimates are significantly more robust and remain meaningful even when applied to deeply distressed bonds. We also sugg…
We examine how heavy-tailed liquidity demand changes price discovery in a sequential limit order book with asymmetric information. In our setting, liquidity suppliers observe aggregate order flow, not its decomposition into informed demand and uninformed liquidity shocks. With heavy-tailed uninformed aggregated order flow, large trades remain plausibly uninformed over a wider range of depths, flattening price impact …