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Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis Vol. 57 No. 3 2022

Counterparty Risk in Over-the-Counter Markets

Christoph Frei1; Agostino Capponi2; Celso Brunetti3,4

1 University of Alberta · 2 Columbia University · 3 Federal Reserve · 4 Federal Reserve Board of Governors

Abstract

We study trading and risk management decisions of banks in over-the-counter markets, accounting for 2 types of risk: payoff risk from loans and counterparty risk from trading activities. Our model provides empirically supported predictions on the structure of the interbank credit default swap (CDS) market: i) banks with high default probabilities either buy or sell CDS contracts; ii) because of the counterparty risk friction, payoff risk is only partially shared; and iii) safe banks act as intermediaries and help diversify counterparty risk. Banks manage their default probabilities to become creditworthy counterparties, but they do so in a socially inefficient way.

DOI
10.1017/s0022109021000491
Volume
57
Issue
3
Pages
1058-1082
Language
en
Sources
bibtex:phds-export.bib crossref openalex

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