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Review of Finance Vol. 10 No. 4 2006

Hope Springs Eternal – French Bondholders and the Soviet Repudiation (1915–1919)

Kim Oosterlinck1; John S. Landon-Lane2

1 Solvay Business School, Université Libre de Bruxelles 1 · 2 Rutgers University 2

open access

Abstract

Repudiations rarely occur due to their extreme nature. This paper provides an empirical study based on an original database: prices of a Tsarist bond traded in Paris before and after its repudiation by the Soviets. A structural VAR is used to disentangle French market shocks from repudiation specific ones. After the repudiation, we identify shocks that are related with bailouts, hopes of partial bailouts, negotiations with the Soviets and the Russian civil war. We argue that bond prices essentially reflected expected extreme events that never took place and were thus subject to a “Peso problem”.

DOI
10.1007/s10679-006-9005-8
Volume
10
Issue
4
Pages
507-535
Language
en
Sources
bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex crossref

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