IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/fip/fedpbr/00003.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Breaking the ice: government interventions in frozen markets

Author

Listed:
  • Benjamin Lester

Abstract

When subprime mortgage defaults started mounting in 2007, financial institutions found themselves unable to profitably sell off these soured investments or raise new equity. As these institutions struggled to reduce their leverage, consumers and firms alike found it increasingly difficult to borrow, which helped trigger a deep recession. Within the context of two popular explanations for the freeze ? asymmetric information and debt overhang ? Benjamin Lester discusses the costs and benefits of policies aimed at thawing markets in a crisis, including direct asset purchases, equity injections, and public-private risk-sharing programs.

Suggested Citation

  • Benjamin Lester, 2013. "Breaking the ice: government interventions in frozen markets," Business Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, issue Q4, pages 19-25.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedpbr:00003
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.philadelphiafed.org/-/media/frbp/assets/economy/articles/business-review/2013/q4/brQ413_breaking_ice_govt_interventions_frozen_markets.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gary Gorton, 2008. "The panic of 2007," Proceedings - Economic Policy Symposium - Jackson Hole, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, pages 131-262.
    2. Camargo, Braz & Lester, Benjamin, 2014. "Trading dynamics in decentralized markets with adverse selection," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 153(C), pages 534-568.
    3. House, Christopher L. & Masatlioglu, Yusufcan, 2015. "Managing markets for toxic assets," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 84-99.
    4. Markus K. Brunnermeier, 2009. "Deciphering the Liquidity and Credit Crunch 2007-2008," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 23(1), pages 77-100, Winter.
    5. Jean Tirole, 2012. "Overcoming Adverse Selection: How Public Intervention Can Restore Market Functioning," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(1), pages 29-59, February.
    6. Kyungmin Kim & Benjamin Lester & Braz Camargo, 2012. "Subsidizing Price Discovery," 2012 Meeting Papers 338, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    7. Myers, Stewart C., 1977. "Determinants of corporate borrowing," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 5(2), pages 147-175, November.
    8. Phillip Swagel, 2009. "The Financial Crisis: An Inside View," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 40(1 (Spring), pages 1-78.
    9. Gary Gorton, 2008. "The panic of 2007," Proceedings - Economic Policy Symposium - Jackson Hole, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, pages 131-262.
    10. Adrian, T. & Shin, H S., 2008. "Liquidity and financial contagion," Financial Stability Review, Banque de France, issue 11, pages 1-7, February.
    11. Lawrence M. Ausubel & Peter Cramton, 2008. "A Troubled Asset Reverse Auction," Papers of Peter Cramton 08tara, University of Maryland, Department of Economics - Peter Cramton, revised 2008.
    12. Burcu Eyigungor, 2013. "Debt dilution: when it is a major problem and how to deal with it," Business Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, issue Q4, pages 1-8.
    13. George A. Akerlof, 1970. "The Market for "Lemons": Quality Uncertainty and the Market Mechanism," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 84(3), pages 488-500.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Braz Camargo & Kyungmin Kim & Benjamin Lester, 2016. "Information Spillovers, Gains from Trade, and Interventions in Frozen Markets," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 29(5), pages 1291-1329.
    2. Daniel R. Sanches, 2014. "Shadow banking and the crisis of 2007-08," Business Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, issue Q2, pages 7-14.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Braz Camargo & Kyungmin Kim & Benjamin Lester, 2016. "Information Spillovers, Gains from Trade, and Interventions in Frozen Markets," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 29(5), pages 1291-1329.
    2. Camargo, Braz & Lester, Benjamin, 2014. "Trading dynamics in decentralized markets with adverse selection," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 153(C), pages 534-568.
    3. Wang, Zijian, 2020. "Liquidity and private information in asset markets: To signal or not to signal," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 190(C).
    4. Alvarez, Fernando & Barlevy, Gadi, 2021. "Mandatory disclosure and financial contagion," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 194(C).
    5. Ricardo J Caballero, 2010. "Sudden Financial Arrest," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 58(1), pages 6-36, August.
    6. Charles Bean, 2010. "Joseph Schumpeter Lecture The Great Moderation, The Great Panic, and The Great Contraction," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 8(2-3), pages 289-325, 04-05.
    7. Giampaolo Gabbi & Alesia Kalbaska & Alessandro Vercelli, 2014. "Factors generating and transmitting the financial crisis: The role of incentives: securitization and contagion," Working papers wpaper56, Financialisation, Economy, Society & Sustainable Development (FESSUD) Project.
    8. Veronica Guerrieri & Robert Shimer, 2014. "Dynamic Adverse Selection: A Theory of Illiquidity, Fire Sales, and Flight to Quality," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(7), pages 1875-1908, July.
    9. Roberto Robatto, 2015. "Financial Crises and Systemic Bank Runs in a Dynamic Model of Banking," 2015 Meeting Papers 483, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    10. Michiel Bijlsma & Wim Suyker, 2008. "The credit crisis and the Dutch economy... in eight frequently asked questions," CPB Memorandum 210.rdf, CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis.
    11. Michiel Bijlsma & Jeroen Klomp & Sijmen Duineveld, 2010. "Systemic risk in the financial sector; a review and synthesis," CPB Document 210.rdf, CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis.
    12. Briana Chang, 2012. "Adverse Selection and Liquidity Distortion in Decentralized Markets," 2012 Meeting Papers 403, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    13. Yaron Leitner, 2011. "Why do markets freeze?," Business Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, issue Q2, pages 12-19.
    14. Amir Amel-Zadeh & Geoff Meeks, 2013. "Bank Failure, Mark-to-market and the Financial Crisis," Abacus, Accounting Foundation, University of Sydney, vol. 49(3), pages 308-339, September.
    15. Kox, Henk L.M. & Leeuwen, George van, 2012. "Dynamic market selection in EU business services," MPRA Paper 41016, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    16. Maya Eden, 2017. "Misallocation and the Distribution of Global Volatility," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(2), pages 592-622, February.
    17. Gründl, Helmut & Post, Thomas, 2009. "Transparency through financial claims with fingerprints: A free market mechanism for preventing mortgage securitization induced financial crises," SFB 649 Discussion Papers 2009-018, Humboldt University Berlin, Collaborative Research Center 649: Economic Risk.
    18. Heinsalu, Sander, 2020. "Investing to access an adverse selection market," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    19. Senderski, Marcin, 2011. "Justifiable thrift or feverish animal spirits: What stirred the corporate credit crunch in Poland?," MPRA Paper 56613, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Michal Jurek & Pawel Marszalek, 2014. "Subprime mortgages and the MBSs in generating and transmitting the global financial crisis," Working papers wpaper40, Financialisation, Economy, Society & Sustainable Development (FESSUD) Project.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:fip:fedpbr:00003. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Beth Paul (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/frbphus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.